Inside The Mind Of A Killer

by Jean-Francois Abgrall

‘I didn’t think about it any more.’

  ‘It wasn’t important?’

  ‘No, that’s right.’

  ‘You told me that you used to cut articles out of the newspaper.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Even about the murders you’d committed?’

  ‘No, no.’

  ‘You never cut out articles about your murders?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not? Because in ’84, for example, for the little girl in Pont-à-Mousson, there must have been articles in the papers.’

  ‘Yes, I read the articles.’

  ‘You read them? And you weren’t scared?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And the first one, did you forget it, or did it bother you for a long time?’

  ‘I know that … it’s true … it bothered me.’

  Pont-à-Mousson, again … I wasn’t sure if he was doing it on purpose to duck the conversation, but the mere mention of old cases reminded him of the crime. Then he would remember very precise episodes. He spoke of them spontaneously.

  We continued our conversation. I told him that I didn’t believe this was his first murder. He observed me.

  ‘But the first time you killed, weren’t you scared afterwards, even then?’

  ‘Yes, I was scared.’

  ‘The very first time, were you alone, all alone?’

  ‘I was alone.’

  ‘I know which one that was, and so do you.’

  Francis Heaulme looked solemn and hunched up on his stool. I told him it no longer mattered. That I wasn’t there for that. My investigation was over.

  ‘I’d say it was a man, am I right?’

  ‘Yeah, it was a man.’

  ‘He was elderly, wasn’t he?’

  He nodded.

  ‘You see, I’ve known it for a long time. You’ve been telling me about it for a long time. I haven’t told anyone. I know the name of the first one.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve forgotten … It was a long time ago. I was a minor.’

  Had Heaulme’s former neighbour, ‘Bouboule’, been the first victim of his violent fantasies? I asked him when he had his second attack. Francis Heaulme replied:

  ‘After my mother’s death.’

  ‘Is that what started it all?’

  ‘That did it. I said to myself: I’m going to do someone in, I’m going to mangle someone.’

  It was my last visit, and I didn’t want to go back over the events. I decided to cut him short and ask one last question:

  ‘I’d like to know what you feel when you’re found out for committing a murder.’

  ‘I don’t feel anything at all,’ he replied calmly, as if surprised at such a question.

  Without warning, he changed the subject and started talking about the suicide of his cell mate. An ageing, sick and disabled man, convicted for vice, about whom he often used to say that death was the best thing that could happen to him. Once again, alarm bells started ringing. What was he playing at? Was he trying to tell me that it wasn’t a suicide? Worse, that he had committed a fresh murder? And yet I had read the reports made at the time: there didn’t seem to be any doubt.

  It was definitely a suicide. I didn’t want to get dragged into a new horror. I preferred to talk about other things with him. His brief love affairs, for example. He was afraid of women, and yet this problem had never affected his behaviour. It was not the trigger for his killer urges, alcohol was. Thinking of a couple of files I’d read in Rosny-sous-Bois, about crimes committed in public places, I asked him:

  ‘Have you ever done anything in front of people?’

  ‘When I want something, I want it, I take it. It’s in my head.’

  His tone was peremptory.

  ‘At any price?’

  ‘Yeah. When I want something, I get it.’

  This man had no limits. He was unbelievably dangerous.

  Before parting, I asked him if we would be battling against each other again at the next trial, as we had done in Quimper.

  ‘We’ll see,’ he replied absently, and rose.

  A brief goodbye and he was already in the doorway. Not another word, not a glance, not a gesture that was different from usual. This last visit was exactly like the first. And then suddenly, just before he went through the barred gate that would separate us for ever, he turned round and said:

  ‘You’ll see, François, we’ll meet again. I know I’ll always see you again!’

  With a moment, he had disappeared before I could find a reply. Once again, he was getting away. Three years later, at Draguignan court of assizes, his behaviour confirmed that it was utterly impossible to find a chink in his armour.

  13

  Acquittal and life

  In the following months, Francis Heaulme went from one court of assizes to another. I did not attend all these trials. In Metz, he was sentenced to life to run concurrently with an eighteen-year sentence for the murder of young Laurence Guillaume. Her cousin got twenty years in jail. There was one significant variant in the defendant’s story: during the trial, Francis Heaulme declared that he ‘was very fond of his father who had tried to help him’. This correction was more in keeping with the evidence gathered during the investigation.

  Another piece of evidence regarding Francis Heaulme came to light. During a medical examination, the doctors detected Klinefelter’s syndrome, a rare genetic anomaly. He had an extra sex chromosome, XXY instead of the usual male arrangement, XY. This was not without significance. Apart from a physical malformation which prevented him from having full sexual intercourse, his behaviour was affected by a feeling of inferiority and confusion in his sexual preferences. Clearly, for an investigator, that can explain the incomplete sexual nature of some crimes and the random choice of his victims, men or women. But the experts were categorical, this anomaly was not the cause of deviant behaviour. Francis Heaulme’s judgement was not altered. It was not serial killer syndrome. Naturally, his counsel did not share this view.

  In February 1994, the Bordeaux court of assizes delivered a verdict that took everyone by surprise. The case of the young conscript from Périgueux ended with an acquittal. The jury had not been able to decide between the two suspects identified in the initial police investigation and the two known criminals, Francis Heaulme and Didier G, charged by the gendarmes for the same crime. The lack of tangible proof, the witnesses’ changing testimonies and the skilful arguments put forward by the seasoned defence counsels did not make it easy for them to reach a decision. Francis Heaulme says, not without irony, to anyone who will listen, that he still cannot understand the verdict. He was convinced he would be found guilty.

  As time went by, I was involved in other investigations, tracking down other criminals. Heaulme gradually went out of my mind. The special unit had been disbanded after the end of the first trial in Quimper. A few departments were still sending in the odd request for assistance, but they were routinely refused, for the reason that I was no longer working on Francis Heaulme. My superiors were still the same and the subject remained taboo. Fortunately, however, as investigators are fond of working with direct contacts, some business can be dealt with over the phone. It was not until 1997 that Aline Pérès’s killer came into my life again. In May, I received a summons to appear before the court of assizes in Draguignan.

  Fate had it that this trial took place just as Belgium was reeling from the Marc Dutroux child murder case. There, child killers were in the headlines. Joris was a little Flemish boy and it was common knowledge that Francis Heaulme had been to Belgium. That was all it took for a swarm of foreign journalists to arrive and ask to meet me. I quickly reacquainted myself with the case. My colleagues from Aix-en-Provence confirmed that there had been no developments since Heaulme had been charged. Francis Heaulme had retracted his confession and the identity of his accomplice was still a mystery. Once again it was a complicated case, but, unlike the first trial, everyone was now familiar with Heaulme. It should be possible to nail him, as it was permitted to refer to
all the cases that had been tried, and his retractions no longer worried me.

  As I was about to leave Rennes for the Riviera, the commander of the criminal investigation unit insisted I travel to Draguignan by train. The south was paralysed by a railway strike and, more importantly, there was no station in Draguignan. I pointed this out, but he remained unmoved. I picked up his written order and kept it to add to my collection of idiocies. In the end, I drove down in my own car.

  At the Draguignan gendarmerie, two colleagues were waiting for me to fine-tune our strategy and polish our testimonies. The local investigations would be referred to by the local investigators. The other investigations carried out by the criminal investigation unit would be kept completely separate. I would cover Heaulme’s personality and behaviour during his last interview. The purpose of this division was to be as clear as possible at the trial and avoid misunderstandings. Each of us would deal with the aspect that he personally had handled, and could thus face the barrage of questions without floundering.

  On 21 May 1997, at 9 a.m., we were outside the entrance of the Var Court of Assizes. These law courts were very different from those in Quimper.

  The court room was vast and suffused with light. The bench was only slightly higher than the witness stand, and the plaintiffs’ bench faced the dock. The atmosphere was not oppressive, it felt like a classroom. Francis Heaulme entered, flanked by two young police officers wearing black boilersuits and boots. Tall as ever, he was wearing his usual shapeless grey and white sweater over a bullet-proof vest that made him more rigid than usual. Restricted in his Kevlar straitjacket, he held himself bolt upright. His hands behind his back, he stood facing the parents of the child, who stared at him. Pursing his lips, he stared right back into their eyes.

  Then came the time-honoured ritual of selecting the jury. The witnesses’ roll-call was quick. They were all sent away until the next day, or even later, except for me. The presiding judge asked the usher to show me to a separate room, explaining that he would call me twice, that day to question me about Francis Heaulme’s personality, and then at a later stage to testify as an investigator. Meanwhile, the defendant gazed attentively around the room. He stared at some of the witnesses, in particular the personnel from the Antibes hospital where he had been an inpatient at the time of the murder. The judge then addressed the defendant:

  ‘Mr Heaulme, do you have anything to say before we begin?’

  Mechanically, Healme replied:

  ‘No, it’s OK. I’m used to the courts by now.’

  From his tone of voice, I could tell he was prepared to fight. During the morning of that first day of the trial, I remained alone in a room. From the window, I watched the life of a Provence market, and time plodded by. I learned later that when the details of the case were read out, the parents were distraught, but it was the young psychologist who was there to support them who left the court in tears. In this child murder case, it was obvious that Francis Heaulme had been aided by an accomplice, especially to reach the scene of the murder. Several other strands of the investigation pointed to the existence of an accomplice, but there was no proof and, so far, Heaulme had never revealed his name. The judge began his examination:

  ‘Mr Heaulme, tell us what you were doing on the day of the murder.’

  Heaulme replied in a clear, confident voice:

  ‘I was at the La Fontonne hospital in Antibes. I played cards. Three patients cheated. I got into a fight. Some male nurses restrained me and I calmed down. Then in the afternoon, I drove to Grimaud with one of the male nurses. He had to book some bungalows for a hospital trip. I went along for the ride.’

  The judge seized the opportunity:

  ‘What’s the name of this man, the one whose car you went in?’

  Heaulme replied:

  ‘I know his name, but I can’t say it. He was in court this morning.’

  The judge suggested a name and the defendant replied that it could be him. The examination continued painstakingly, then, abruptly, the mood changed. Francis Heaulme suddenly embarked on a new description of the murder scene:

  ‘The kid wasn’t dead. The man who was with me came back. He saw the kid. He said, “We’ve got to get rid of him.” I said, “No, we should take him to hospital.” The man wanted to hit me and added, “If you say anything, I’ll kill you.”’

  In the room the tension rose. To avoid any kind of incident, the judge decided to suspend the examination briefly. He invited the mother of the young victim to take the witness stand. This step is often requested by the plaintiffs who want to tell the court of their suffering. Everyone dreads these moments, as they often lead to emotional outbursts. The tension rose even higher. A slim young woman dressed in white with dark circles under her red eyes entered the witness box. The mother of little Joris was holding three sheets of paper which she began to read slowly, with a slight accent:

  ‘Your Honour, ladies and gentlemen of the jury. For months I have known that as soon as the accused entered the court room I would turn to gaze at his hands. Those hands that killed my child in cold blood. It was a shock: those thin hands were hands that should build, not destroy. But it is in thought and mind that wickedness and perversity exist. Why, why? It is a question to which we will never have an answer. That question will haunt us all our lives. Lives that have been utterly shattered, that will never be as they were before.’

  After a long pause for breath, she continued:

  ‘Eight years ago, we were a very happy little family. Steven was fifteen, and Joris nine. Since that 5 April, our day-to-day life has been a constant battle against emptiness, despair, helplessness and the absurdity of Joris’s death. Joris had barely started his life, life which he loved so much. He had everything to hope for, his future belonged to him. He was like a sparkling stream, running over waterfalls and rapids from time to time. Sadly, that stream will never reach the sea.’

  Joris’s mother paused. She looked exhausted. But then she continued:

  ‘Can you imagine what Joris must have suffered that terrible night! Discovering new things was his passion. But in pursuing his exploration of life, which was just beginning for him, he was unlucky. That life was brutally taken from him, in such a cowardly manner.’

  She looked at the jury, and then at the court, and went on:

  ‘We know that Francis Heaulme had an accomplice and that he cannot be found. To him, I wish to say this: I do not understand how you can live with such a secret. I know that sooner or later you will be punished, if only by your conscience which must be tormenting you. If you have children, are you able to look them in the eyes?’

  Then, slowly, she turned to Francis Heaulme.

  ‘And to the accused, I want to say this: you adored your mother. Luckily for her, she is dead and I’m glad, glad that she does not have to go through this. I pity her, because for a mother, it is appalling to learn that one’s child is capable of killing human beings, an innocent child. It is high time for the accused to be convicted. For eight years, he has dominated our lives, he’s been pulling the strings. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, a few years ago, France passed a law on the appropriate sentence for child murderers. Apply it! Your Honour, in the name of all the accused’s victims, for the sake of their families and especially in the name of Joris, I beg you, ensure that this man receives proper psychological help in prison, that he receives proper treatment so that he never does this again. He must be prevented from creating further victims at all costs. (…) For us, it is already too late. The accused gave Joris the death sentence, and he gave us, Joris’s father, mother and brother, a life sentence. We have to go on living with a grief that is almost unbearable, with a shadow that will hang over us for ever, with Joris beside us. My husband and I have never known hatred, but our struggle is to prevent other parents from experiencing the same hell. Your Honour, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, we beg you to take this into account when you pronounce your verdict.’

  Soundlessly, the woman went back t
o her seat. Some jurors had tears in their eyes, as did many other people in the room. The judge was quick to seize the moment and turned to Francis Heaulme:

  ‘You must tell her who was with you. Tell her, Mr Heaulme!’

  Impassive, he replied:

  ‘It was Mr B. His car was a blue Fiat. If I denied it was him, it was because he threatened to kill me.’

  There was a murmur of utter disbelief. B, one of the nurses at the hospital summonsed to appear, was scheduled to testify the next day.

  The psychologists and psychiatrists then gave evidence. Their reports were similar to the previous ones. One of the doctors did, however, describe Heaulme’s intelligence as borderline. The expert mentioned Klinefelter’s syndrome. He spoke of a chromosomal abnormality, and expounded at length. The defence tried to use the information. According to the counsel, it was more than likely that this anomaly was at the root of his client’s pathological behaviour. As far as he was concerned, Heaulme could not be considered normal and, from that point of view, he could also not be deemed responsible for his actions. The expert refused to endorse this theory.

  When the usher showed me to the witness box, I knew nothing of what had just transpired. I was more relaxed than at the Quimper trial. Heaulme was serving a long sentence, and whatever happened here he was not about to be released. During my testimony, I went over the various cases in which the accused had been involved, and mentioned the changes in his behaviour. I explained that he changed his tune according to his interlocutors and went from the haziest initial version to conclude with the utmost precision.

  ‘How did he behave with regard to the case we are concerned with?’ asked the judge.

  ‘He is manipulative. He knows the name of the person who was with him on the day of the murder, but he won’t say. It would backfire against him. It is the first time he’s been tried for the murder of a child. He doesn’t want to admit the inadmissible.’

  Heaulme did not take his eyes off me, but he remained inscrutable. Nobody commented. That first day also saw an intervention by Pierre Gonzalez de Gaspard, who asked for the trial to be postponed. He wanted an order for further information to be gathered so as to identify the second man. However the judge ruled that the trial would continue.