The case of the murder of a woman in her seventies, perpetrated on January 12, 2014, is about to be elucidated thanks to the investigations of the center dedicated to cold cases of the Nanterre public prosecutor’s office.
More than ten years later, the murder of Michèle Grandin in Draguignan, on January 12, 2014, is no longer a “cold case”. As revealed by our colleagues at RTL, a 28-year-old man was arrested, indicted and imprisoned at the beginning of June, information confirmed by the Nanterre prosecutor’s office to BFMTV.
He is suspected of being the author of the murder of this 78-year-old woman who was found dead in her Var home, severely beaten. The suspect in question was already in the custody of investigators in 2014, and had even been placed in police custody. This man had, however, provided an alibi which, at the time, allowed him not to be prosecuted, specifies the prosecution.
A member of the victim’s entourage
Since then, if a judicial investigation had indeed been opened two weeks after the events, the case had slipped. But after the creation of the center dedicated to unsolved criminal cases (PCSNE), within the Nanterre public prosecutor’s office in March 2022, the Draguignan investigating judge then withdrew from the investigation a few months later, thus leaving Emmanuelle Ducos, the vice-president in charge of instruction at PCSNE, will take the reins of instruction.
“The re-exploitation of the seals ordered by the latter made it possible to redirect the investigations towards a member of the victim’s entourage at the time of his death, already suspected in 2014 but not prosecuted given the alibi that he had provided”, specifies the Nanterre public prosecutor’s office.
As a result, “the man, now 28 years old, was returned to police custody on June 4, 2024,” continues to specify the prosecution.
After hearings, he was brought before the investigating magistrate before being indicted for murder of a vulnerable person. He was presented to the judge of freedoms and detention who placed him “under criminal committal warrant”, concludes the prosecution.
Alexis Lalemant, with Stéphane Sellami
