Did the accused target newborns because of their skin color? A 36 -year -old woman was sentenced on Friday in Vannes (Morbihan) to 18 years' imprisonment for having kidnapped a baby and tried to kill his mother by the late, after having sprayed a footballer whom she also wanted to fly with acid The child.
Laëtitia Penvern, tried since Tuesday by the Morbihan Assize Court for attempted assassination and kidnapping of a minor, faces life prison for these facts. The Advocate General had claimed 18 years' imprisonment, explaining that he had revised his requisitions downwards because the accused recognized during the trial a part of the facts which she persisted to deny until then, in particular his intention to remove the baby From the footballer Yoane Wissa to Ploemeur (Morbihan), the evening of July 1, 2021.
That day, Laëtitia Penvern had closely watched the comings and goings of the sportsman, who is currently playing in the English team of Brentford, but which still played at the time at the Lorient club, following him. The player had become the father of a little girl a few weeks earlier and the accused finally admitted that she had penetrated at night at Yoane Wissa's home in order to leave with the baby.
But the Congolese international had surprised her on the ground floor and she then sprayed him with a bottle of acid. Yoane Wissa, blinded and who had to be operated with an eye, had managed to put her to flee by shouting and kicking the judge.
-Laëtitia Penvern had made everyone believe those around her, including her companion at the time, that she was pregnant and that her little daughter was hospitalized in Rennes due to complications. “Consulated by her lies and various stratagems, she had found no other solution than to remove a newborn child who can physically correspond to the one who was expected,” said the Lorient prosecutor's office after the young person indictment woman, as a couple with an Ivorian.
The day after the assault, Laëtitia Penvern went back in search of a newborn baby. It was in Vannes, after pretending to be a social worker, that she had removed the baby from a couple from Gambia, after having sprayed the young mother of alcohol to burn and ie. The victim was seriously burned on 25 % of the body and his condition is not yet consolidated to date, said his lawyer, Me Philippe Arion.
Laëtitia Penvern had been quickly identified by the investigators and arrested on July 3 at her home, with the newborn kidnapped the day before. The thirties, mid-long blond hair and who says he heard “interior voices” since adolescence, had apologized to the victims during the trial.
