for Omar Raddad, the fight for innocence continues

Even if his lawyer Jacques Vergès died in 2013, the fight for Omar Raddad’s innocence continues. The Moroccan gardener, sentenced in 1994 to 18 years’ imprisonment for the murder of Ghislaine Marchal and pardoned in 1996, changed lawyers and called on Sylvie Noachovitch. The doors on which appear the inscriptions “Omar killed me” and “Omar killed me” are again at the center of the case: in 2015, the Nice prosecutor granted new expertise. Four different DNAs were discovered. However, justice did not seek to identify them.

Master Sylvie Noachovitch asked for an expertise on these doors, to make these unknown traces speak. “On the door of the boiler room, we have genetic fingerprints which are really located: unknown genetic fingerprint 3 and unknown genetic fingerprint 4, on the bottom of the door”explains Laurent Bréniaux, expert in genetics.

Unknown DNA found on bloody letters

According to the defense, someone else wrote with the blood of Ghislaine Marchal. On this subject, Laurent Bréniaux makes a hypothesis: “On this trace of the fingers of the hand which is placed, could we not, for example, press the fingers as if we were holding the hand of Madame Marchal and press our fingers at the same time, leaving the ‘DNA next to it?’

Concerning a possible presence of the DNA of Omar Raddad, the observation is clear. “At no time, whether on the cellar door or the boiler room door, has Omar Raddad’s genetic fingerprint been characterized.”

Excerpt from the series “Omar Raddad, the last fight”, broadcast in “1:15 p.m. on Sunday” on February 26, 2023.

> Replays of France Télévisions news magazines are available on the Franceinfo website and its mobile application (iOS & Android), “Magazines” section.