The Unspeakable Crimes of Dr. Petiot

by Thomas Maeder

  PETIOT Yes, about a third of them.

  LESER Details?

  PETIOT Oh! There was Jo le Boxeur. He told us he was a poor bastard gone astray because of an unhappy childhood. His real name was Grosjean or Granjean [this was false]. He offered to betray Lafont. He wanted to be part of our group, and offered us four hundred thousand francs. But we knew that he just wanted to discover the escape route like the others. We were a bit scared of him because he was huge and mean, but when his time came, he fell on his knees and begged. The woman with him pulled out a revolver. She was one hell of a woman.

  Adrien le Basque was easy to spot. You only needed to look at his face to see what he was. Monsieur le Président, if you wouldn’t mind passing around his photograph, the people can see for themselves. He was tough, and he caught on right away. We had to shove a gun in his ribs to get him into the truck. He was taken to the rue Le Sueur, and he pulled out a knife. One of my men was wounded near the liver before we killed him. It was a real butchery.

  DUPIN It’s true that the men worked for the Gestapo, but why did you kill the women?

  Petiot shrugged. “What did you want me to do with them?”

  DUPIN That sort of reasoning could take you far.

  PETIOT They whored for the Germans. They would have denounced us.

  DUPIN Have you no respect for human life?

  PETIOT For the lives of Gestapo members? No. Have you?

  DUPIN What gave you the right to judge and execute people?

  PETIOT If there had been a procureur de la République at the time, we would gladly have let him take the job. It was not a very pleasant one.

  DUPIN How much money did you get?

  PETIOT We didn’t work for money. We didn’t get a penny.

  DUPIN What about the four million Estébétéguy sewed into the shoulder pads of his suit?

  PETIOT Why ask me? You’ve got his suitcase right there. Why don’t you have a look?

  The clerk tried to extricate an ivory-colored suitcase with black leather corners. The pile teetered and threatened to fall, and Leser hurriedly called a recess until things were safe.

  PETIOT You’d better post guards in the room; we don’t want anybody stealing anything! [Turning to Floriot] Say, if they do find some money, do I get ten percent?

  After the recess, the clerk pulled out several suits. Petiot snatched them, waved them in the air, and threw them back at the clerk.

  PETIOT You see? The shoulders are intact. Why should they have hidden money anyway, since they had no intention of leaving?

  FLORIOT Look, Petiot, why don’t you give me a chance to do my job? Maître Dupin, why should they have wanted to escape, anyway?

  DUPIN They were criminals. The police were after them.

  FLORIOT You’re not serious. You don’t honestly believe members of the Gestapo were afraid of French policemen?

  Petiot was asked about the groups of Jews sent to him by Eryane Kahan.

  PETIOT Yes, I killed the Basches and the Wolffs. I didn’t know they were Jews, but I knew they were German spies sent by Eryane Kahan.

  DUPIN What about the Schonkers—the parents of the Basch couple?

  PETIOT I don’t know anything about them, but if it makes you happy, you can put them on my account. They came from the same bunch, and if I had met them I would have killed them.

  DUPIN Why didn’t you kill Eryane Kahan if you knew she was collaborating with the Germans?

  PETIOT I hoped she would send me more traitors. If she had sent me a hundred I would have killed a hundred. And she would have been the hundred-and-first.

  DUPIN I don’t see how you can call the Wolffs traitors. They were Jews fleeing the Nazis. They were one hundred percent Resistants.

  PETIOT They were Germans.

  BERNAYS They fled Holland on July 12, 1942, and were in constant fear of arrest.

  PETIOT They came from Berlin.

  FLORIOT I have here a report written by Inspector Batut. It says that the Wolffs entered France with a passport issued in Berlin and which is perfectly in order.* Frightened refugees do not apply to their government for a passport. When they arrived in Paris they “hid” in a hotel requisitioned by the Germans.

  PETIOT They hid the way I did on my honeymoon. I pulled the sheets over my head and said to my wife, “Try to find me.”

  As the court settled into place on the fourth day, Petiot was heard addressing the audience.

  PETIOT A certain General V—Victor, I believe—had been parachuted into the countryside near Lyon. To capture him, the Germans mobilized four hundred prostitutes! Another—

  LESER We are not here to listen to war stories, Petiot, but to discuss the case of Yvan Dreyfus.

  PETIOT Very well. Dreyfus was sent to me through Guélin and Chantin—sad individuals, those two. Guélin got in touch with Fourrier, the barber. It was in Fourrier’s apartment that I met Dreyfus. Fourrier had told me that Dreyfus had just been released from the camp at Compiègne and had to get out of the country as quickly as possible. At the time I didn’t have very many men; most of them had gone to Lyon for a bit of mopping up. It was obvious that Dreyfus was a Jew. He told me he worked in the radio business, and by questioning him, I could see that he knew what he was talking about. Guélin was a lawyer. I was completely taken in. I said to myself, “This is something different from Jo le Boxeur and his kind. We’re going to get this man out of the country.”

  LESER Did you ask him for money?

  PETIOT I never asked for money. It was Fourrier who did. I took Dreyfus toward the Concorde, and on the way Robert Martinetti met us and led Dreyfus in the direction of the Naval Ministry and the Champs-Elysées. I went home.

  LESER What happened to Dreyfus?

  PETIOT I don’t know. Maybe he went to South America, maybe my group killed him—I never had the chance to ask. It was because of that traitor that I was arrested the next day. The Germans tried to pretend that Guélin and a certain Beretta had been arrested as well, but they gave themselves away and I knew it was a trap. They asked me what had happened to Dreyfus. I told them, “If he’s a Jew, what difference does it make to you that he’s disappeared? And if he’s an informer, don’t worry, you’ll find another.” I was risking my neck, Monsieur le Président, but it was fun.

  LESER We’re not asking whether you had fun.

  FLORIOT I would like to point out that there is a Gestapo file, dated 1943, furnishing incontrovertible proof that Dreyfus agreed to act as an informer. There is no cause to be sentimental over the fate of Yvan Dreyfus.

  VÉRON What reason do we have to believe a file of which there is only one copy, and no original?

  DUPIN If Dreyfus were still alive, no one would dream of prosecuting him.

  PETIOT Dreyfus was a traitor four times over: a traitor to his race, a traitor to his religion, a traitor to his country, and a traitor—

  LESER Don’t moralize, Petiot, it doesn’t become you.

  The cases had been presented in the chronological order of their discovery. The Knellers came last, and everyone anticipated a dramatic turnabout. How could Petiot accuse a German Jew of collaborating when the victim was only seven years old?

  PETIOT Kneller was one of my patients. I can’t tell you what I was treating him for. It was an embarrassing affliction and professional secrecy prevents me from revealing it.

  Petiot had said this before. He seemed to think that by hinting that Guschinov, Cumulo, and Kneller had socially shameful diseases he would halt questions about them or possibly discredit them.

  PETIOT Kneller told me he wanted to escape to the free zone. He didn’t have very much money. He already owed me two thousand francs for his treatment. I paid for his false papers out of my own pocket and asked him to leave me his furniture as collateral.

  DUPIN And you took it to the rue Le Sueur.

  PETIOT Look, I’m not really very proud of this. They were Germans.

  LESER Germans who fled their country when the Nazis came to power.


  PETIOT They’ve probably already returned and are getting ready for the next war.

  LESER Oh, leave us alone with your “next war.”

  PETIOT At the rate things are going, we won’t have long to wait. Anyway, the Knellers spent the night at the rue Le Sueur. I told them to take two bottles of cognac as a present for the man who would lead them across the border.

  DUPIN There was a child.

  PETIOT Yes, he was a delightful boy.

  DUPIN “Was” is the operative word. His pajamas were found in your house. So was a shirt with Kurt Kneller’s initials.

  PETIOT Those must be the pajamas in which he slept that last night. Why would they want to take dirty laundry with them—particularly with their initials on them? And what earthly reason would I have to keep such things?

  DUPIN This is where your system of defense falls apart. During the instruction you didn’t even dare answer the questions you were asked about the Knellers.

  PETIOT That’s not true. I answered plenty of questions. I stopped answering them when I was told to sign a list of three hundred sixty-two questions no one ever asked me.

  DUPIN Judge Goletty showed you the clothing inventory and you refused to comment.

  Floriot woke from apparent slumber. “You just say anything that comes into your head,” he said to Dupin. “Petiot never saw that inventory. Show me the interrogation in the dossier that proves he did. You’ve never even read the dossier. Show me the proof and I’ll stop practicing law right now.”

  Elissalde tried to whisper to Dupin, but the latter charged ahead in righteous indignation.

  DUPIN Judge Goletty repeated it to me just this morning.

  FLORIOT Then call him to the stand and we’ll see.

  PETIOT No one showed me the list or the suitcase. Who knows what has been put in those suitcases?

  Leser adjourned the court for fifteen minutes. When they reconvened, there was no further mention of the inventory. Dupin had seen Goletty in the hall and learned that Floriot was right. Dupin would never listen to Elissalde, did not know the details himself, and grew tired of looking foolish. Finally he stopped challenging Floriot on questions of fact altogether, and thus weakened the prosecution even further. The defense walked all over him.

  The presentation was over, and the first witness was called. Commissaire Lucien Pinault took the stand. He had worked on the case from the beginning and it was he who had taken over from Massu and led the investigation following Petiot’s arrest. He stepped up with confidence, but even before he could begin, Petiot caught him off guard and elicited a testimonial.

  PETIOT Was I known to frequent unsavory places or to associate with criminals or loose women?

  PINAULT No.

  PETIOT Did people think of me as a greedy man who valued money above all else?

  PINAULT No, you seem to have left rather the opposite impression.

  PETIOT [choking with emotion] Thank you.

  Pinault recovered himself and gave evidence showing that Petiot and Cumulo looked nothing alike.

  PINAULT And among all the people I interviewed, none had ever heard of Dr. Petiot or Dr. Eugène.

  PETIOT You just made a mistake, that’s all. But don’t worry, it’s not your fault.

  FLORIOT Didn’t your investigations show that Guélin was working for the Germans?

  PINAULT He was an informer, yes.

  FLORIOT Haven’t two bodies found near Marly been identified?

  PINAULT Well, it’s not within my jurisdiction, but I have heard that two Gestapo agents were found buried near the woods at Marly.

  An inspector Poirier took the stand. He had spoken with several hundred of Petiot’s patients, he testified, and many of them were frightened by the doctor’s eyes.

  PETIOT Here we go. They’re going to start saying I’m crazy again.

  Floriot forced Poirier to admit that Eryane Kahan was an adventuress and that Lafont, before his execution, had acknowledged the participation of Réocreux and Estébétéguy in his group. Floriot then read a 1942 police report stating that Dr. Braunberger had returned home several days after his wife reported him missing, and he gently chided Poirier for making unproved assertions. The report had been only a means of closing a seemingly pointless investigation, and had no basis in fact. But fact quickly seemed to be losing its importance in the trial. The press chalked up another round for Petiot and ridiculed the incompetence of Dupin and Leser.

  On the fifth day, the court was scheduled to go to the rue Le Sueur. Petiot had demanded that the jurors see the building about which so many lies had been written and discover for themselves just how innocent it really was. Professor Charles Sannié, the director of the Identité Judiciaire, took the stand. He had conducted the inspection of the building, and now gave the court a long and tedious description of what they were about to see. Long before he finished, the journalists went to their cars and raced madly across Paris, running red lights and shouting to startled policemen and pedestrians: “Get the hell out of the way! Petiot is coming!”

  At 2:00 P.M. the official proceedings moved from the Palais de Justice. Leser daintily lifted the hem of his scarlet robes as he descended the steps. Petiot turned his coat collar up against the rain and smiled at the onlookers. The streets around the court building had been barricaded, and fifteen cars and a swarm of motorcycle police waited to effect the move with, as one person claimed, the maximum amount of chaos and discomfort.

  The rue Le Sueur was closed to traffic, and three hundred policemen were stationed along the block to maintain order. Spectators crowded every window and shop, and repeatedly burst through police lines to get a closer look at Petiot. Flanked by two inspectors and surrounded by gendarmes, the handcuffed Petiot was led into his house. “Peculiar homecoming reception, don’t you think?” he asked one of Floriot’s assistants.

  Leser did his best to retain some semblance of dignity. Dupin looked irritable and sulked throughout the visit. A fine rain continued to fall, and the long judicial robes dragged in the mud and sodden lime. The journalists, audience, and neighbors tried to fight their way past the police. One reporter was thrown to the ground, the sleeve of a gendarme’s uniform was ripped off, and Maurice Petiot’s wife Monique was seen kicking another policeman. Someone tried to close the front door. Leser shouted: “My God, don’t do that! Court is in session and it must be a public audience! Isn’t that so, Maître Floriot?” Floriot grinned. Leaving the courtroom had been an unusual step, and there were a thousand opportunities for a mistrial.

  The crowd forced its way in and set off in all directions. The library was ransacked. Someone threw a bale of papers out of a window to those waiting in the street. Mothers, with the newspapers’ maps of the building in their hands, showed their children the stove and the pit. Leser frantically tried to collect the members of his court. One group of lawyers posed in the courtyard, smiling, with human thighbones in their hands, while photographers took pictures.

  The court moved into the doctor’s consultation room. No one had thought to have the electricity turned on. Candles were brought, and the whole visit was punctuated by the striking of matches as they blew out.

  PETIOT Truly this is enlightened justice!

  The avocat général, his robes covered with plaster dust and cobwebs, moodily explained the layout of the building.

  DUPIN From here, the victim followed that corridor, which leads to the triangular room, where he thought there was an exit. He entered, and tried to open the door on the far wall. Before he discovered that it was false, the door behind him closed. It was locked with a chain and had no knob on the inside.

  Leser, Dupin, Petiot, Floriot, Sannié, and three jurors managed to pack themselves into the triangular room. Their candle blew out; no one could find a match, nor did they dare move in the utter darkness. A cry went up, and a few moments later a policeman pushed through with a flashlight, like Diogenes gone astray. They noticed that the viewer was not in the wall.

  FLORIOT Where is the
viewer? It was supposed to be under seals.

  SANNIÉ I don’t know.

  FLORIOT You don’t know! You had better find it or you should lose your job.

  SANNIÉ I think it was left in the courtroom.

  PETIOT Despite Monsieur Dupin’s macabre description, I had intended to install a radiation therapy machine in this room.

  SANNIÉ Don’t be ridiculous. You couldn’t even get an examination table in here, much less the machinery.

  DUPIN This is where you killed your victims after locking them in.

  PETIOT If you know anything about construction, you can see that the walls are only thin plaster. That wouldn’t hold anyone. Besides, it’s impossible to kill anybody in this little hole. Monsieur le Président, how would you go about killing someone in here?

  A JUROR Petiot told us the executions took place in a truck.

  PETIOT [nonchalantly] Oh, well, of course you can kill anywhere. [Suddenly losing his temper] If I had told you I had never killed anyone, I could understand your obstinacy. But I admit that I executed several people, so what difference does it make whether they were killed here or there? Why do you keep harping on such silly things? The rest of the world really is going to think we’re a bunch of imbeciles in France!

  Dupin kept trying to speak, but no one paid much attention. He finally pouted: “Will you let me say something? If things are going to continue like this, I’m leaving.” As the conversation went on around him, Dupin left and wandered aimlessly from room to room. The rest of the jurors and lawyers were ushered into the triangular room in three shifts. Outside, the people wandered about, and Leser rushed around trying desperately to keep order: “No smoking in the courtroom!” “Silence in the court!” The strangely informal circumstances promoted a certain camaraderie, and one lawyer who had vehemently attacked Petiot was heard chatting with him: “Listen, my dear fellow …” “Yes, of course, old chap …”

  The court arrived at the stables and found Dupin there, but he dashed off. “Wait a minute and I’ll get out of your way,” he said. “You’ll have more room like that.” As they stood in front of the pit, Petiot turned pale, tottered, and almost fell in. When they descended the stairs to look at the stove, he stumbled again. Journalists wrote that at last his crimes had proved too much for him. It turned out that Petiot was taken from prison in the morning before breakfast and returned after dinner: he had eaten only a slice of bread and a bowl of thin soup each evening for the past four days, and was merely faint from hunger. Leser made sure he was better fed from then on.