The trial of Jean-Marc Reiser for the assassination of Sophie Le Tan entered the heart of the matter on Tuesday with the examination of the personality of the accused, then the hearing of several women who crossed his path even shared his life. All described the physical and verbal violence they suffered and especially the difficulty they had in getting out of his grip.
“I was a handsome man” boasted Jean-Marc Reiser to the personality investigator, when she asked him about his love life. Many women, sometimes several in the same day, told the story of the man who, at 61, no longer looks good in his box in the Assize Court. Some relationships last several years, Jean-Marc Reiser even has a daughter, Amandine, he is a grandfather.
He became violent without me knowing why
Before the court, the former companions of the accused evoke his impulsiveness. A man who “freaks cables”. “He was unpredictable” recounts the first witness, who rubbed shoulders with him for four years in the 1980s, “He became violent without me knowing why”. He throws a glass in her face, threatens her with a knife, punches her.
Joelle, her daughter’s mother, had a ten-year relationship with the accused. They did not live together. She recounts a chilling scene: “Once he caught me in the kitchen and I fell on the lit stove, I got burned and my head hit a piece of furniture”.
But Jean-Marc Reiser manages to convince his companions thatthey are responsible for what happens to them. “When you’re in there, you always think it’s your fault, and you lock yourself in“Explains Joëlle again “and then I had to take care of my daughter”.
Can one be both “a predator” and a loving father, questions Me Giuriato, one of the defense lawyers? “Yes we can be both” she replies “and then a child idealizes the absent”. Amandine was born in 1992, the same year then the following ones, Jean-Marc Reiser leads trips in Asia. In 1997, he was arrested and imprisoned for rape, sexual assault, possession of weapons and narcotics.
“I quickly understood that he was skilled for the handling “says a fifty-year-old woman. A student at the time, she met Jean-Marc Reiser when they were both working at the Post Office. First, he helped her with work, long rounds, then they put together and she moves in. One day when she doesn’t come on a date, he picks her up in the car, takes her to the forest and beats her up.
I’ve been scared for ten years
Violent, humiliating, according to these witnesses, Jean-Marc Reiser is also a hard man to leave. Isabelle, the post office student, forced to live with him a few weeks after the episode in the forest, manages to leave the apartment. As she is about to leave Strasbourg for Brest, she finds him on the station platform. He will even harass her as far as Brittany: “Arrived in Brest, I was scared. I was scared for ten years. I felt it behind me wanting to hurt me”.
Another conquest, met in Corsica, explains that her family organized a real escort around her, when she dared to leave Jean-Marc Reiser. But that the harassment ended when she told a teacher at her gym: “Is it you who has problems with someone? Don’t worry it will stop.” His approaches to the police had yielded nothing.
Anne, his last companion, also tries to end their relationship, but also undergoes threats and intimidation: “He reminded me that I was dependent on him. I did not have a license in particular (…) And then in the long run, I had the impression that he had feelings for me”
It is with Anne that Jean-Marc Reiser was to have dinner the day before September 7, 2018, the day of the disappearance and death of Sophie Le Tan. He canceled, she says, because he had a Le Bon Coin meeting the next morning, “It seemed strange to me (…) when I returned to his house later, what struck me was that his apartment was so well cleaned”.
What do these former companions of the accusations that weigh today on Jean-Marc Reiser ? One wins: “20 years ago I spoke! Today I speak! What’s the point? He’s still here!”
Reiser is an iceberg, 10% above, 90% below
The mother of her daughter, she says to herself “annihilated” : “When he got out of prison, I thought he had changed. When I learned about the disappearance of Sophie Le Tan, I was stunned, and I said to myself that he had hidden his true face.” “For me”she adds, “Reiser is an iceberg, 10% above, 90% below, nobody really knows him”.
How does Jean-Marc Reiser react to the terrible picture described by the women in his life? He makes gestures of annoyance, he raises his eyebrows ostentatiously, seems to think that everything is fake and seems to smile behind his mask.