On May 2, 2022, the justice rendered its decision. Gérald Descamps was sentenced on appeal to 18 years in prison for the murder of Caroline Pirson, deaf and mute. A real defeat for the defense and its master lawyer Caroline Jean, who has continued to paint the portrait of an innocent man and to proclaim the lack of evidence. A tricky affair due to the fact that the judicial world has been put in difficulty in the face of deaf and hard of hearing litigants. In France, there are 5 million people with deafness. The show Criminal investigation on W9 presented by Nathalie Renoux was interested in the case in its edition of July 12, 2022.
The tragedy occurred on December 31, 2016. That day, in Aisne, the body of Caroline Pirson, 47, was discovered in her apartment by her father, worried about not hearing from her. Jacques Pirson saw the body of his inert child, disfigured by numerous stab wounds to the head which is covered with a plastic bag. The media Marianne looked into this particular trial.
Gérald Descamps, one of his friends at the time, was arrested after the discovery of traces of DNA on the victim’s stolen credit card. His profile challenges: a reputation as a womanizer, two convictions for domestic violence, a tendency to gambling. He was sentenced on November 18, 2020 for murder and fraud. During the appeal trial, the lawyer Caroline Jean who defends Gérald Descamps describes a “loving father trying to integrate into society despite his disability“. She pointed out in particular that the accused was connected to his Facebook account at a time when the police accused him of having withdrawn money with the deceased’s card.
Other suspects had been identified by the police, such as a lover of the victim, who had sex with her on the same day as the murder. He had abruptly stopped contacting her the day of her death, whereas he had showered her with messages before. Indicted, placed in pre-trial detention for eighteen months, he finally received a dismissal. Another key witness, ex-companion of the victim who had just broken up with him, could not be properly heard by the courts.
“We were confronted with this during all the instruction, and then in the prison systemsays Maître Caroline Jean in the pages of Marianne. Absolutely nothing is planned and my client has been living for five years in an environment where no one speaks his language, where the only psychological support he can claim is an unqualified nurse with whom he talks on little bits of paper. It is completely isolated. We can speak of institutional mistreatment.“
Gérald Descamp’s lawyers have announced an appeal in cassation.