On the day of her death, from a cardiac arrest, August 6, 2020, Amandine, 13 years old, weighed only 28 kg for 1.55 m. The consequences of a “cachectic” state, extreme weight loss, associated with sepsis and a possible syndrome of inappropriate renutrition, according to the forensic doctors’ report. The trial of his mother and his stepfather opens this Monday, January 20 before the Hérault assizes, in Montpellier.
In pre-trial detention since May 2021, Amandine’s mother, Sandrine P., must answer for “acts of torture or barbarity leading to death without intention of causing it”, in this case for having notably “starved” her “. This former waitress, mother of eight children born from three unions and aged 54, must also answer for intentional violence against Amandine over the previous six years.
His companion since 2016, Jean-Michel C., 49 years old, is tried alongside him and risks 30 years of imprisonment for having “deprived care or food” of his daughter-in-law and having done nothing to “save her from certain death”, according to the indictment order consulted by AFP.
“Starving process”
Heard the day after Amandine’s death, Sandrine P. explained that the teenager suffered from eating disorders, which no one has confirmed, and that the day before she would have only agreed to swallow a piece of sugar, a little compote and a high-protein drink, before starting to vomit and then stopping breathing.
-“There is no doubt that Amandine endured from [sa mère] destructive and paroxysmal violence, the sole purpose of which was the desire to drag him into shameful and humiliating agony,” according to the investigating judge in charge of the case in his investigation report.
Amandine was in fact from a very young age her mother’s whipping boy, who deprived her of food, inflicted endless “writing punishments” on her and locked her in a storage room, under the surveillance of cameras. The most serious events took place from March 2020 with the first confinement due to Covid, when the young girl stopped going to school. A “starvation process” then takes place, indicates the investigating judge, quoted by “Libération”.
According to the psychiatric expertise, Sandrine Pissarra, described by those around her as angry and violent, was able to “transpose her hatred” of Amandine’s father onto the body of her daughter. The verdict is expected by Friday at the latest.
