“It’s awful. I didn’t sleep well last night because of that.” Like this resident interviewed by “Le Parisien”, the town of Taninges (Haute-Savoie) is struggling to recover from the terrible tragedy that occurred on Tuesday. That day, Déborah P. killed her three children aged 13, 11 and 2 with a stab in the family chalet located in a hamlet outside the village. The next day, the 45-year-old Franco-Swiss woman was found dead in her vehicle in Champéry (VS). The identity of the victim has, however, not yet been confirmed.
The mother was well known in the Giffre valley: she had been a teacher at the primary school in Samoëns, a local village, and was involved in local life. The forty-year-old was notably a member of the municipal harmony of Samoëns as an experienced flautist, and was treasurer of the music school, reports “Le Dauphiné”. “I didn’t know that Déborah was depressed. That she commits suicide is already a tragedy, but she didn't have to take her children with her,” confides a villager from Taninges.
Several witnesses remember an uneventful teacher: “Déborah was great with the children. A great teacher, very popular at school. It’s an atrocious story,” says an employee of the Samoëns school, for example. However, not everyone shares this opinion. Last year, Déborah P. was transferred to Marnaz, a quarter of an hour away, after a petition and several complaints from parents.
“She was not at all cut out to be a teacher. She was odious with the children,” a retiree while shopping told the “Parisien”. This grandmother continues: “She forced the students to stay standing because they moved too much, threw pencil cases in their faces…” “You have to be careful with complaints from parents, it’s quite common in the profession”, nuance one of his colleagues.
Déborah P.'s three children were part of a blended family. The 11-year-old boy and the 13-year-old girl were born from a first union. The 2-year-old was the son of the companion of the forty-year-old, with whom she lived in this chalet in Suets d'en Haut. In the school that the two youngest victims attended, emotion is at its height: “Teachers left crying. They stopped their course. Lots of students were crying in the corridors, it’s really sad,” says a class friend of the young girl.
