The trial of Kévin Bérardi, 33, is being held from June 26 to 28 before the Doubs Assize Court in Besançon. The accused is on trial for violently killing Thomas Mercier, a watchmaking engineer, aged 30. On November 9, 2021, he entered his building and attacked him with around twenty scissor blows, before leaving the premises. The victim died following these serious injuries. The attacker explained that he did not know the man he had attacked.
That morning, Kévin arrived in front of Thomas Mercier’s building before 8 a.m. The day before, he and his girlfriend at the time had booked a room at the Mercure hotel, right next door, a room whose window overlooked the victim’s building. Kévin Bérardi entered the building several times that morning, knocking on the doors of certain tenants as he passed., without really seeming to know what he’s doing. At 11:34 a.m., Kévin Bérardi knocked on the front door of Thomas Mercier’s apartment. The latter opens: the attacker then takes out a tear gas canister which he activates, before inflicting a total of 22 scissor blows on his victim. Some of these blows fatally injured Thomas, notably puncturing his lung.
Kevin then leaves the apartment, leaving behind a seriously injured Thomas Mercier. The latter’s neighbor, having heard noises in the apartment, goes out onto the landing and comes to Thomas’ aid, staying with him until help arrives. Despite resuscitation attempts, Thomas Mercier died around 12:30 p.m.. Kévin goes into his hotel room, showers, comes out and begins a journey of a few hours in the city center of Besançon, buying clothes, talking to several people about his Christ mission, before being arrested by the police at 4:50 p.m. when he returned to the hotel.
The accused did not know his victim
“A gratuitous and terrible act“, analyzes a commander of the judicial police at the bar, who describes a “very violent fight scene“, during the findings of investigators in the victim’s apartment. After months of investigation, it is still impossible to know why Kévin Bérardi committed such an act.. “He never explained it and we were unable to find out the causes of his murderous act.“, explains the commander.
It is also difficult to analyze what happened in the mind of the accused at the time of the facts. During his two hearings in police custody, his version of what happened on November 9, 2021 changed. He first mentions a friend who threatened him, because Kévin owed him 75,000 euros – Kévin and his girlfriend explain that they fled to Besançon and took a hotel room precisely because they were afraid of this friend in question. But during his second hearing, the accused “delivers a mystical, religious speech he says his name is “Righteous”, having been commissioned by Jesus to kill that day.”
Kévin Bérardi regularly used cannabis since adolescence, and had started taking cocaine when he was 19. According to his girlfriend, he had gone out two days before the incident with a friend, during which a large quantity of cocaine was consumed.
Abolition of discernment or not?
So was Kévin Bérardi aware of what he was doing at the time of the events? On this central question of the trial, the experts do not agree, which has been the source of tension. at the hearing, Thursday June 27. An expert psychologist saw Kévin in May 2022, two expert psychiatrists also examined the accused, in February 2022 and September 2022 respectively, and did not draw the same conclusions at all.
According to the first psychiatrist, Kévin did not have a psychiatric illness before the events. But he evokes a “favorable breeding ground for the development of psychotic disorders“, notably with repeated cocaine use over many years. It was following a major psychotic episode that Kévin committed the murder of Thomas, a form of “psychotic decompensation“The illness then set in. According to this doctor, Kevin’s discernment at the time of the murder was only impaired. He believes that Kevin is not schizophrenic.
Which is not the opinion of the second psychiatrist, who explains that Kévin was already ill before the events, presenting a discreet form of schizophrenia, which has developed since. For this doctor, “Kevin’s discernment was abolished at the time of the events.” This is a central question in this trial, on which the court will decide on Friday June 28.
