On the occasion of the release of the book "Victor Kessler didn’t say everything" by Cathy Bonidan (Éditions de La Martinière), a look back at the major criminal cases that marked France.
About 900 people are victims of homicide each year in France. Among these cases, only two or three will make an impression. As the crowd of onlookers once rushed to witness the execution of a condemned man, today we are fascinated by the news. And it is often with guilty pleasure that one delights in books, television series or films inspired by these affairs. In France, some 30 or 40 year old crimes continue to fascinate.
Reality, this fiction that goes beyond us.
Jean-Claude Romand, the murderer mythomaniac
Jean-Claude Romand and his wife Florence formed a united family with their children Caroline and Antoine. He, a brilliant doctor, a researcher at the World Health Organization (WHO), was the very image of success. However, on January 9, 1993, Jean-Claude Romand murdered his wife with a rolling pin and his children with a rifle. Two days later, the man swallows barbiturates and sets fire to his home. He was just saved by the firefighters. That's when we discover the unimaginable. Jean-Claude Romand did not work at the WHO, he was not even a doctor. His days were spent on motorway service areas or in libraries. This admired and esteemed man was actually riddled with debt, a life of lies about to be exposed. Condemned to life imprisonment with a twenty-two year security period, Jean-Claude Romand was finally released on June 28, 2019. This extraordinary story inspired the writer Emmanuel Carrère to write a fascinating book: The Opponent (P.O.L, 2000).
The Grégory affair, the endless affair
Grégory Villemin, 4, disappeared on October 16, 1984 while playing in front of the family home in Lépanges-sur-Vologne, in the Vosges. A few hours later, his body was found in a river. The images of the child, feet and fists tied, his hat folded over his eyes, have left a lasting impression. Bernard Laroche, the cousin of Grégory's father, is arrested following the testimony of his sister-in-law, Murielle. If this eventually retracts, certainty remains in the mind of the father of the child who shoots his cousin with a shotgun in March 1985. 36 years after the murder of little Grégory, and while his mother Christine Villemin was also suspected, the mystery remains.
The exceptional dysfunctions of education and the unprecedented media boom have made the Grégory affair history. A child murdered in a small village in the Vosges, a mysterious crow, a family ravaged by hatred, the Grégory affair carries with it the elements of a black novel. Television series, documentaries, books on the murder are legion. In Victor Kessler didn't say everything, the new novel by Cathy Bonidan (Editions de La Martinière), the author evokes this terrible tragedy. But it is to another matter, totally invented that one, that she is attached. His investigation in the land of lies and truth is a total success.
Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès, the twists and turns of a perfect crime
In April 2011, the entourage of the Dupont de Ligonnès family worried that they had heard nothing from Xavier, his wife Agnès and their four children. The shutters of the Nantes residence are closed, sms and telephone calls remain unanswered. The bodies of Agnes, her children and two family dogs were finally discovered under the terrace of the house on April 21. Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès has vanished. An international search warrant was immediately issued against him, but 9 years later, the father was still missing. Many thought they had seen it around the world, and there were hundreds of reports. On October 11, 2019, the press dramatically announced the arrest of Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès at Glasgow Airport. The photo released by the authorities is raising doubts, but there is already talk of cosmetic surgery to justify the little resemblance between the father and the man arrested. A DNA test will finally clear Guy Joao, a 69-year-old French retiree.
The Flactif affair, a live lie
If the Flactif case had such an impact, it is not only for the atrocity of the crime committed: the murder of Xavier Flactif, his wife Graziella their three children Grégory, Lætitia and Sarah on April 11, 2003 in their chalet in Haute – Know. A few days after the family's mysterious disappearance, David Hotyat and Alexandra Lefevre testify before the cameras of the TF1 Sept à Huit show, openly criticizing the Flactif residents of which they were the tenants. The amazement is immense when the couple is arrested and David Hotyat finally confesses to the fivefold murder. Impossible in front of these freezing images not to think of Patrick Henry, guilty of the murder of little Philippe Bertrand in 1976. He too had played the game of the media, not hesitating to declare with extraordinary confidence: " The real criminal deserves the death penalty for attacking a child. The death penalty will barely escape the death penalty thanks to the commitment of his lawyers Robert Bocquillon and Robert Badinter.
Victor Kessler didn't say everything, Cathy Bonidan's new novel (Editions de La Martinière) is available in bookstores. A breathtaking suspense story that leaves the reader no respite.