“This is not the trial that the victims are waiting for,” says the lawyer for the civil parties

The lawyer for the civil parties and the father of Estelle Mouzin left the courtroom, regretting not being able to question Monique Olivier immediately after a victim’s statements.

“Monique Olivier must be able to answer, but you forbid us from questioning her !”, exclaimed Friday, December 1, the lawyer for the civil parties Didier Seban, during the 4th day of Monique Olivier’s trial at the Hauts-de-Seine Assize Court, in Nanterre. The lawyer, as well as Estelle Mouzin’s father, left the courtroom, noted a journalist from France Bleu Auxerre on site. The two men are angry at the methods of President Didier Safar who has refused, since the trial opened on Tuesday, for the court to question the accused outside of the time reserved for her interrogation.

“We have the impression that we are doing this trial just for the recordsaid Didier Seban. When a victim comes to tell us that she met Michel Fourniret and that she met Monique Olivier, with a lot of emotion, we simply have to question them!”insists the lawyer about the ex-wife of the serial killer. “You have to ask her, ‘Did you meet her? Did you go to her home?'”

“In 5 days, she will say that she does not know what we are talking about. We are dealing with someone who must be questioned and re-questioned to try to move forward on a truthproclaims Didier Seban. If we do the trial just to finally result in a conviction of Monique Olivier, without knowing anything more about the crimes committed in the case, well it is not the trial that the victims are waiting for and I think that this is not the case. “It’s not respecting them to do the trial under these conditions.”concluded Didier Seban.

Monique Olivier, the ex-wife of serial killer Michel Fourniret, has been on trial since Tuesday at Nanterre for complicity in three crimes: the kidnapping and death of Marie-Angèle Domèce (1988), of Joanna Parrish (1990) and Estelle Mouzin (2003). She has already been sentenced to life imprisonment for being complicit in other crimes by Michel Fourniret. The serial killer was notably sentenced in 2008 to life imprisonment without reduction for seven murders of young girls in France and Belgium. He died in 2021 at the age of 79.