The arrest of Michel G. required the intervention of the Raid in Emerainville. More than three years after the tragedy, the time has come for this 77-year-old man to explain himself. From this Monday – and for three days – this father is on trial for murder and attempted murder. And this, as a repeat offender due to a previous conviction for robbery.
The stakes are high: the septuagenarian faces life imprisonment for having, on May 30, 2021, taken the life of Jennifer, 41, with whom he had had a relationship in the past. The victim was killed by four gunshots to the head and chest. The accused is also on trial for having injured one of his neighbors with several bullets.
The hearing promises to be complex, with the versions of the witnesses and that of the accused not really agreeing. The criminal jury will delve into the twists and turns of the sentimental life, also complicated, of Jennifer – married and mother – and of Michel G., to try to understand the criminal act. One clue perhaps: that of the accused's jealousy and the strong attachment he felt towards the victim.
The drama unfolded on Sunday May 30, 2021, at the end of the day, in an apartment in the three-story building located at 1 place Saint-Just, in Emerainville. At Rabah's, more precisely, a friend of Jennifer's. The accused – who lived in the same building – had appeared in the accommodation, the door having never been locked. He was armed with his 38 caliber revolver. Did an argument have time to break out? Were words or insults exchanged? Who was really in the room and where? The debates in the Assize Court will perhaps shed more light on this.
The fact remains that Michel fired in the direction of Rabah, wounding the sixty-year-old in the chest and arm. Before pointing his gun at Jennifer. According to Rabah, the latter had fallen to the ground when the accused shot her in the head, at point blank range. The versions differ on this point. Only one certainty: after his crime, Michel returned home with his weapon and locked himself in his apartment. Perhaps with the intention of committing suicide. This triggered the intervention of the Raid, an elite unit of the national police specializing in assaults. After an exchange with the negotiator, Michel surrendered without violence to the police around 10:25 p.m.
At the end of his indictment before an investigating judge of the Meaux court, Michel G. appeared before a judge of freedoms and detention. “I have never slapped a woman. I never thought I would do this one day. It was like a spark but I immediately regretted what I did,” he explained to the magistrate, who placed him in pre-trial detention. The accused was automatically placed in solitary confinement. The personality of this former robber, sentenced in 1988 and 1996 by the Assize Court of Charente-Maritime and that of Pas-de-Calais to two sentences of twelve years of criminal imprisonment, will be at the heart of the trial.
