« I am his daughter, I am his blood. I don’t understand, if he loved me so much, how could he do this? » The words used by the teenager are calm, thoughtful. Since that day in March 2021, the sight of a knife has been unbearable for him. Since that day, she has been afraid that he will do it again. A few steps away, in the accused box, his “progenitor” listens to him with a low gaze, his face expressionless.
This 58-year-old man has been on trial since Thursday, June 27, by the Charente-Maritime Assize Court, meeting in Saintes. He is accused of having attempted to murder his daughter and kill his wife, armed with a knife, on March 17, 2021, in the parking lot of the Maine Gaudin equestrian center, in Saint-Palais-sur-Mer, near Royan. He had wanted to “punish” his wife, who had decided to leave him a few days earlier.
Directive
The couple formed in 2003 in Poitiers (Vienna) at his workplace, a manufacturer of safety equipment. He was 38 years old, two children – who decided to stop seeing him in the mid-2000s – and had just divorced. She was 25 years old and found him “charismatic”. Marriage in 2005, then birth of their daughter in 2008. The salesman works a lot. He is on the move every week, in France or abroad.
“He carried his directive management at work home,” says his ex-wife, at the helm. He imposed a lot of things, it was oppressive. » Her daughter describes a “complicated” family life. “My father always wanted perfection and I was looking for his love,” says the teenager.
“Kind”, “doting father”, “loving”, “non-violent”, “hardworking” are the terms that come up in the mouths of those close to the accused… All of them, without exception, still do not understand what could have been going on in his head on Wednesday, March 17, 2021.
Dismissal
How did it get there? Presumably, the period of confinement linked to the health crisis and Covid-19 did not do the fifty-year-old any good and therefore in turn the couple. “Before, he was always on the move, now he was at home,” says his ex-wife who finds him even angrier. In July 2020, the family moved to Vaux-sur-Mer to be closer to the parents of the fifty-year-old.
At the same time, his professional life was shaky. His employer criticized him for not being present enough at his only client in Belgium. He stopped going there from the start of the lockdown. “I was afraid of Covid, afraid of dying, that pushed me to stay at home,” he explains. While his company wanted to fire him for his shortcomings, his wife told him she wanted to leave him. “For me, everything was fine between us,” he sums up, denying any desire to control them.
“You’re not going to do that?”
On March 11, 2021, the forty-year-old plucked up her courage and announced her desire to leave him. “I was very afraid of his reaction and I knew that things were going to be very difficult for him,” recalls the teenager’s mother. Indeed, the news drove him mad. After work, his family turned their backs on him. On Sunday, March 15, mother and daughter stayed with a colleague, giving them time to turn around.
Arrives Wednesday, March 17. The mother drops her daughter off at the Maine Gaudin equestrian center for the afternoon. “When I arrive, they tell me that they saw my father a little earlier,” the young girl recalls. I didn’t see his car, that relieved me. » Around 6:30 p.m., her mother came back to pick her up. Returning to her car, the forty-year-old sees her husband appear, a knife in his hand.
I thought we were going to die. Luckily we had adrenaline and it worked
“I understood straight away! I remember his super black look! He pointed the blade at our daughter’s heart. I remember saying to him: ”Aren’t you going to do that?” He replied: ”Ah yes, I’m going to do it!” I did everything to fight. » She defends her daughter who manages to escape, injured in the left breast. His mother blocks the knife with her right hand, which is lacerated. “I thought we were going to die,” she admits. Luckily, we had adrenaline and it worked. »
The teenager managed to alert Jérôme Garnier, a teacher at the equestrian center. “I saw that there was a fight in the distance,” testified the 57-year-old man. “The woman was on the ground and the accused was standing bent over her. When I saw the blade, I continued to tell him to stop.” The perpetrator of the blows fled after trying to touch his ex-wife’s neck. “You saved your daughter’s life,” emphasized the president of the assize court. “Yes, I think so, but she saved my life too.” The verdict is expected this Friday evening.
