his father’s pre-trial detention “is not justified”, believes his lawyer, who plans to appeal to the Court of Cassation

“This pre-trial detention is not justified”, estimates the lawyer of Mathis’ father, interviewed Wednesday May 8 by France Bleu Normandie, after the indictment of Sylvain Jouanneau for intentional homicide. Mathis Jouanneau, then aged 8, disappeared in September 2011 in Caen (Calvados), during a weekend with his father.

Sylvain Jouanneau was already sentenced in Caen in 2015 to 20 years in prison for kidnapping and sequestration. An investigation into intentional homicide continued after the trial and new elements led the investigating judge to decide to indict him for intentional homicide on April 24. His continued pre-trial detention was confirmed on Tuesday by the investigating chamber of the Caen Court of Appeal. His lawyer plans to appeal to the Court of Cassation.

“It is a decision which will complicate his conditions of detention and which will distance me from my client”, regrets Master Félix Gluckstein. Sylvain Jouanneau has, since his indictment, been transferred from a prison in Dordogne to the Ifs remand center, near Caen.

Since Mathis’ disappearance in 2011, Sylvain Jouanneau has always refused to say what he had done with the child, claiming that he had entrusted him to third parties abroad. The lawyer for Mathis’ mother believes that he “will never say anything”. But it’s not so sure, replies Sylvain Jouanneau’s lawyer. “We are moving forward step by step,” confides Félix Gluckstein. “I’m not saying it couldn’t vary, because we’ve had some interesting discussions about possible avenues to perhaps unblock things in one direction or another.”