The starting signal is given. One judicial center dedicated to “serial and unsolved crimes”, was launched on Monday, February 28, in Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine). The aim is to allow the “cold cases” (“cold cases” in English) “to remain alive judicially and to offer an answer to the victims”, in the words of the Minister of Justice, Eric Dupond-Moretti, pronounced in January, when the implementing decree was published. Franceinfo details the role of this center and its operation.
1How was this pole created?
The idea of such a center germinated at the end of the work of the commission responsible for reflecting on the improvement of the judicial treatment of “cold cases”, directed by Jacques Dallest, the public prosecutor near the court of appeal of Grenoble (Isère). After receiving the report of this commission, the Chancellery opted for a national pole in charge of serial or unsolved crimes. Its creation is registered in the law for confidence in the judicial institution, promulgated on December 22, 2021. So that this national pole can see the light of day quickly, the father of Estelle Mouzin, who died nineteen years ago, wrote a letter to Eric Dupond-Moretti on January 5. to ask him to implement it very quickly.
In this mail, consulted by franceinfo, Eric Mouzin was worried about the departure, on December 31, 2021, of the investigating judge in charge of the investigation into the disappearance of his daughter. According to him, thearrival of a new magistrate to follow this long and tedious file weighed the “risk of a calamitous instruction”while Judge Sabine Kheris distinguished herself in this case by going back to Michel Fourniret. The latter finally admitted, in 2020, to having kidnapped Estelle. Eric Mouzin feared “a loss of information in the processing of ongoing investigations” as well as the “dismantling of a competent and efficient team”. He ended his letter by insisting “on the urgency to act”. The Keeper of the Seals finally responded on January 12, in an interview with 20 minutes : “We wanted to go quickly, so it will be launched on March 1.”
But the idea is far from new. Eric Mouzin kept asking “a body of specialized judges” in missing children cases. Like other families of the disappeared, he had made it one of the strengths of his fight. “We have been asking for this pole for twenty years (…) it was an emergency”reacted on franceinfo the lawyer Corinne Herrmann, who defends Eric Mouzin alongside his colleague Didier Seban. “It was time for us to provide an answer to the families”, she added when she learned of the creation of this center dedicated to “cold cases”.
2What is it used for ?
This new pole must above all make it possible to counter the effects of the passage of time. “In the investigating offices, the judges work for a limited time and are then replaced by colleagues. We thus see in the very long files, the complex files, three or four magistrates who follow one another”, explains the Minister of Justice. “However, the passage of time is the worst enemy of the elucidation of a case, because sometimes the witnesses will live elsewhere, because the memory fades, for a thousand reasons”, continues Eric Dupond-Moretti.
One of the goals is to avoid prescription. Because once the file is closed, the prosecution can no longer be exercised, except – a rare occurrence – if new exploitable elements arise. For most crimes, the statute of limitations is twenty years from the last procedural act. This very often leads families to multiply the steps to prevent the file from being closed forever.
Saving time, but also efficiency: this is the other promise of this new judicial entity. “It will allow us to have judges who will specialize, like anti-terrorism judges or financial judges. They will be magistrates who will only deal with these cases and who, of course, will develop specific techniques, but above all will understand them. much better“, emphasizes Corinne Herrmann. “We say to ourselves that it is better that everything be concentrated in one place, with dedicated magistrates, and we can see if there are not disappearances that are alike”, emphasizes, on France Bleu Isère, Dalila Boutvillain, whose brother Malik vanished in May 2012 while jogging in Echirolles (Isère).
3What is its organization?
This jurisdiction is made up of three investigating judges,a first vice-president and two vice-presidents. The first vice-president is a forerunner, in other words he is in charge of setting up this pole. On the parquet side, there is a magistrate, three clerks and two specialized lawyers. These magistrates are 100% seconded to this judicial entity based in Nanterre, within the jurisdiction of the Versailles Court of Appeal.
Sabine Kheris, the judge who distinguished herself in the Estelle Mouzin case, was appointed head of this new pole. Proposed at the end of January by the Chancellery, his candidacy was validated by the Superior Council of the Judiciary, the Ministry of Justice told franceinfo on February 21. “We have every confidence in the skills of this experienced and humane magistrate to understand and deal with the issues of cases that are old cases or serial killers”welcomed the lawyer Corinne Herrmann on RTL. “We hope that she will be joined by magistrates who will make it possible to respond to many families who are awaiting a response.”
4How should it work?
“Cases that have not been elucidated after eighteen months of fruitless investigations may be transmitted to the pole. But that does not mean that all the cases which have lasted eighteen months without us being able to find a trace of the author will be divested in favor of this pole”, specified Eric Dupond-Moretti. “Victims will be able to enter this center but not directly. They will be able to ask the prosecution that their case – or their cases if there are several families concerned – be examined by this center”, he added.
“The investigating magistrates will have full freedom to continue with the initial investigators or to seize a service specialized in unsolved crimes, such as the Diane division in Pontoise. A co-saisine with the initial investigators and the specialized services is also entirely possible”details the Keeper of the Seals. The Diane division (Unsolved Cases Division), launched by the gendarmerie in October 2020, is made up of a multidisciplinary team of around thirty investigators, including specialists in detecting the serial nature of crimes, behavioral analysts or even criminal analysts. It also relies on the skills of the 250 scientists from the Criminal Research Institute (IRCGN), also based in Pontoise.
“We start the file from scratch, we atomize it according to the skills of the staff, whether at the technological or scientific level”by re-studying seals or making new reconstructions, General Fabrice Bouillié, head of the Central Criminal Intelligence Service of the National Gendarmerie (SCRCGN), told AFP in January. “The idea is to put everything into perspective by developing new investigative hypotheses”he continued.
“They will be able to handle a lot of business, but I think that it will be necessary in a second step, probably later, the creation of one or more regional poles which will allow better proximity with families”, at estimated the prosecutor Jacques Dallest, on France Bleu Isère. An idea that the magistrate defended in his report. In fact, thehe law for confidence in the judiciary provides for the possibility of such an evolution if the executive so decides.
5What cases await the judges?
No less than 240 ongoing cases could be entrusted to the three investigating judges. In detail, France has 173 unsolved crimes for which justice is seized and 68 serial crime proceedings, according to the Keeper of the Seals. “In the firm, we have 80 so I think that number will explode. We estimate that there are 200 unresolved cases every year so if we do the math, over several years, there are really a lot of cases that have accumulated”believes, for her part, Corinne Herrmann.
Among the most publicized, the Grégory Villemin affair, this young boy found dead in Vologne (Vosges) in 1984, the quadruple murder of Chevaline (Haute-Savoie) in 2012 or the disappearance of Estelle Mouzin, a case in which eight magistrates have succeeded.