The couple had a verbal argument on Saturday evening. On Sunday morning, the mother disappeared with the family vehicle. She was found a few hours later, in Visé, around fifty kilometers from her home. According to her first statements, relayed by the prosecution, the main suspect noticed the death of her little boy around 6 a.m. She explained that she had “feeling like I'm living a nightmare” and then she left“with dark thoughts”. She again said she didn't remember anything.
Maïté, 35, wanted to “leave with her children”: “I ask for forgiveness”
The Liège public prosecutor's office will no longer communicate on this file
The investigation is only in its early stages. The Liège public prosecutor's office, in agreement with the investigating judge, has decided to no longer communicate on this file, he told us on Wednesday. We must therefore be careful not to draw hasty conclusions. If this absolute tragedy touches us so much, it is also because it occurred in a seemingly uneventful family, which resembles many others, and with which we can identify: parents unknown to the justice system. , who both work, a child, two dogs, a plush house with photovoltaic panels, a garden…
And suddenly everything collapses in absolute horror. How to understand the inconceivable? A doctor specializing in forensic psychiatry, Samuël Leistedt gives some keys to understanding.
What goes through a parent's mind to end up taking the life of their child?
This type of event is unfortunately not that rare. In any case, this is my experience, what I see in my files. When mothers commit this type of act, there are obviously several hypotheses. In the most classic form, it is a gesture – sometimes a gesture of love – which simply aims to extract the life from their children because in their analysis of things, in their reading grid, the world as it It's so bad, so hard, that they want to spare their children that. This is something we see quite often.
What are the other reasons that push a mother to do the irreparable?
There are a series of other scenarios. Gestures like these occur for example in couple conflicts, although in these cases, it is more often men who will, in quotes, take revenge on their partner by hurting or killing the children they have together.
Charlotte lost her two children, killed by their father
Could this be a crazy move on the part of a mother?
There is in fact the whole field of mental pathology. These actions can be committed by mothers who have real pathologies which had not been highlighted until now. The illness that has been brewing for some time will unfortunately manifest itself in a very acute, very brutal way, through this type of action.
In this case, what triggers the gesture?
Acting out occurs when there is stress, frustration, a loss of direction, something that is sometimes extremely minor. We don't always find what we call the “trigger”. Because, for us, it doesn't matter, but for this person, it does.
Geneviève Lhermitte could not explain why she killed her children by slitting their throats
Does it happen that the mother doesn't remember anything afterwards?
Yes, this is something we encounter regularly. The situation is so appalling that the content of the act is repressed. We prefer to forget rather than live with it. It is a security measure, a defense mechanism to maintain a semblance of psychological integrity.
Are there other hypotheses for this oversight?
Yes, there may be other mechanisms. We sometimes find ourselves faced with extremely problematic personality profiles where there can also be malice. That is to say, we say we don't remember it when we do remember it.
Is the same mechanism at work for fathers who kill their children?
The characteristics are still very different. Most of the time, when men commit this type of act, two elements are present. First and foremost a personality disorder: we are dealing with very narcissistic or very antisocial personalities. The second element, which often goes hand in hand, is the presence of couple conflicts. Without caricature, the man will, for example, during a separation that he considers unbearable, not attack the woman directly but the children to hurt her. We are not at all in the same process.
