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BLOOD
BATHROOM
BLOOD
ACT 1 THE MANHUNT
The night of July 8, 1995,
I slept really badly.
I woke up around 5:30 a.m.
with a knot of anxiety.
I'm not sure how to describe it, but the feeling
was very intense and violent.
I looked at my watch
and I waited until 8:30 a.m.
before I called Hélène.
And then, something extraordinary happened.
A man answered.
I thought I'd dialed wrong.
I hung up.
I called back and got a man again.
I asked, "What's going on?" He was a fireman.
At that point,
I remember saying, "Put my daughter on.
What's going on?"
And the man said…
I can still hear his voice…
"No ma'am, I can't put her on."
-It's over? -"Yes, it's over."
PARIS-EAST-BOBIGNY
On our way to Paris, we stopped frequently
at every rest stop to call back.
There was no answer.
We drove all those miles
without knowing.
There was just that man who'd said,
"Yes, it's over." Period.
We followed the police car
to the famous police headquarters at 36 Quai des Orfèvres.
Obviously I asked them what had happened.
1ST FLOOR LANDING FACING THE VICTIM'S FRONT DOOR
I felt the stab in my heart.
Right there.
THE KNIFE
BLOOD, TABLE, KNIFE
ENTRANCE, BEDROOM
PILLOW, EXHIBIT N°1, BED
27 YEARS OLD PSYCHOLOGY STUDENT
JULY 8, 1995
I DON'T WANT TO LIE TO YOU,
I DIDN'T SLEEP EITHER THE NIGHT OF JULY 7-8.
PARIS CRIMINAL POLICE HEADQUARTERS
NATIONAL POLICE THE POLICE, A MAN'S JOB
My father and grandfather were policemen.
But I'll admit
I've always been drawn to active lines of work.
OFFICER IN SKIRT CATCHES THE STRANGLER
I've never dressed up as a guy.
"WOMAN-COP"
I was the first woman to head the Crime Brigade.
It's an elite unit, France's best
in terms of criminal investigation.
THE LADY AT POLICE HEADQUARTERS
I began running the Crime Brigade in early February 1996.
CRIME BRIGADE
The Crime Brigade immediately told me
about the murders of young women.
They dumped a stack of files on my desk and told me to get on with it.
Two cases immediately stood out,
Agnès Nijkamp.
AGNÈS NIJKAMP 12.10.1994
BEDROOM BODY OF AGNÈS NIJKAMP
32 YEARS OLD INTERIOR DESIGNER
The other case was Hélène Frinking.
She had been murdered in similar conditions
to the Nijkamp case.
Her body displayed roughly the same wounds.
We had to get the scumbag who did this.
We wanted to avenge them.
Let's not mince words.
That's your motivation. We all have it, not just me.
It becomes a personal quest.
In other words,
it was down to him or us. We had to win. We had to get him.
VICTIM: HÉLÈNE FRINKING BORN 02/12/67 IN HOLLAND
Hélène was the fourth of six children.
I was highly influenced by the sun.
Hélène is for Helios, the sun.
In 1995, she was almost 27.
She wanted to go to Paris to study psychology
TWO WHITE MARKS
In the Frinking case,
we were lucky to have DNA.
The same was true for Nijkamp.
Semen had been found on her body.
CRIME BRIGADE
Then a witness statement was delivered to me.
Elisabeth was a victim
who escaped from her assailant.
BUTCHER’S KNIFE NECK
He bound and gagged her.
When he went to turn out the light,
which was upstairs because it was a duplex,
she got out, since the bedroom
was on the ground floor.
She managed to wriggle free and escape.
She was an important witness for the investigation.
23 YEARS OLD OCCUPATIONAL THERAPIST
We also had DNA,
because he smoked and we found a Winston cigarette butt.
We were able to link the three cases
since the DNA matched.
MALE DNA
The DNA was labeled "SK" for serial killer,
because the three crime scenes were linked.
But unfortunately, unlike the British who already had a database,
we didn't have one.
If we'd had a database,
maybe we'd already be arresting him and identifying him.
But we didn't.
UNKNOWN MALE DNA
I learned that there was a survivor.
A girl called Elisabeth.
Before Hélène's murder,
she'd managed to escape from the same attacker.
The DNA was the same. It was amazing.
Her testimony was a great help.
She was able to establish
a police sketch.
She described a North African man.
She was quite pleased with this sketch.
That's how she truly saw him.
He had a buzz cut so we checked out soldiers,
prisons, the Foreign Legion, firemen, police. He was athletic.
You get the idea.
The muscular type.
We also noted that the women were attacked
in the evening or at night.
So we looked into night workers.
We checked cab drivers and so on.
Anything that corresponded to our observations
and the young woman's testimony.
She was very brave, in fact.
She went out into Paris with the unit.
Particularly the 11th arrondissement,
to see if they might run into the guy.
FOOTPRINT IN BLOOD
I learned early on
that he'd left a footprint
in blood near the bed.
It turned out his second toe
was longer than his big toe.
WANTED INDIVIDUAL
Apparently that's quite common,
a lot of people have this. It's called an Egyptian foot.
We had all our suspects take their shoes off
to check their feet.
We were looking at tiny clues,
because we didn't have much to go on.
I saw the guy everywhere.
I saw him as a bus driver.
I saw him pretty much everywhere.
My daughter's apartment is right above that door.
This is it.
My daughter was here and the young man was there.
The guard could see him from there.
I had to find him.
I absolutely had to find him!
I went to Hélène's street
and asked all the shopkeepers
if they'd heard about it.
People didn't know.
The police had not checked out Hélène's street or neighborhood.
That was a shock.
She was very, very involved. She followed it closely.
She wanted to investigate with us.
It was hard to turn her away.
You can't really do that.
All this relates to the case.
I was the pain-in-the-ass resident, but I'm not sorry.
I wanted to carry out a co-investigation.
That's a good thing, right?
You did this and this, but have you done that?
Obviously, they got tired of it.
But I didn't let up.
I kept at them from the start.
The thing is, she needed to realize
we weren't twiddling our thumbs.
We lived and breathed those case files.
They were with us 24/7.
The work was massive!
Granted, we couldn't find him.
A woman, a mother,
she falls and suffers.
Then she gets back up and fights.
That's the truth.
WITNESS STATEMENT ELISABETH O.
"CALL ME FLO"
She learned, no doubt through Elisabeth,
that he'd mentioned the name Flo, Florian or something.
You'd see "Flo" on trucks.
It was a truck company.
ON THE BACK OF MANY TRUCKS?
I passed so many trucks just to check out the drivers.
I'd stop at rest areas
to check out the drivers.
Later I learned that "Flo" was also
the name of a restaurant.
So I thought it might be someone
who worked in a Flo restaurant.
It was a popular chain in Paris.
There was one on the boulevard
where she walked home that night.
I made sure they went and checked
the lists of employees, etc.
I pressured them a bit.
She told the judge
that maybe we should…
follow that lead,
so we questioned…
a bunch of employees
from the Flo restaurants.
595 CASE FILES
Nothing came of it. Nothing at all.
AUGUST 31, 1997
The Princess of Wales died last night
in a car crash in Paris under Alma bridge.
She was with her boyfriend Dodi Al-Fayed, who was also killed.
The Crime Brigade, headed by a woman, Martine Monteil,
will lead the investigation. She was on site immediately.
It was very difficult and stressful.
We were already overwhelmed at the Crime Brigade.
We didn't need a traffic accident!
But when it's the Princess of Wales, you can't ignore it.
That's impossible. There's pressure
from the highest level of government.
We had to move heaven and earth, if I can put it that way. So we did.
I told the guys it was our job.
That's just how it is.
I put a team on it right away.
But as soon as we could, we returned to their cases.
Because although this accident involved deaths,
the circumstances weren't disturbing.
Whereas here we had dead girls,
and above all, a guy on the loose!
And we still hadn't found him.
HALLWAY FRONT DOOR
On September 23, 1997, we got a call.
A young man had discovered
his fiancée at her home
in the 19th arrondissement.
We went immediately.
BLOOD MARKS DINING ROOM
CURTAIN, BLOOD BEDROOM
FILE CABINET TELEPHONE
When I walked in, I literally froze.
I thought, "No way, he's back at it."
19 YEARS OLD STUDENT
Magali Sirotti's parents were outside the building.
It was a horror show.
When you wake up in the middle of the night,
and see her face in her coffin,
all you can think about is how she must have suffered.
What else can you say?
How she must have suffered!
Magali was such a terrible blow.
I knew right away it was him. It was so obvious to me.
So obvious.
It was too late for my daughter. But there mustn't be others.
Close friends were telling me,
"Look, you're not a cop or a lawyer. You're not this or that.
You're a mother, so go see the mother."
I went to see the mother.
And it was…
an extraordinary meeting.
The victim, Magali…
She was engaged, about to get married.
When we reached the crime scene
of Magali Sirotti,
it wasn't a slap in the face, it was a sledgehammer.
She was dead because we hadn't arrested him.
Good God, what did we miss?
We've been busting our butts on this case!
Where's the clue to unravel? What can it be?
Why is this girl dead?
The guy is still on the loose.
We need to move fast and be more on our toes.
If he's still out there, he might do it again soon.
Period.
I'm a journalist, I deal with cops,
police, criminals, bandits.
Back then, women journalists who wrote about crime didn't exist.
I was the first.
The cops at the Bureau saw me as this little gal,
a nosy reporter, a snoop.
I had a certain style.
Miniskirt, biker jacket, high heels.
The cops at the Bureau couldn't figure me out.
At first, I played naive.
They quickly realized I wasn't actually that naive.
Late September 1997,
I met a cop from the Crime Brigade.
He told me,
"On September 23rd we got the case
of a young woman named Magali Sirotti.
The perp tied her up and raped her.
It was a heinous crime.
And this crime
may be linked to other rape-murders."
I said, "Really?"
"How can you be sure it's the same guy?"
He said, "For Magali, we're not sure.
Same modus operandi. We're waiting for DNA.
But for two other murder victims
and one survivor, we have DNA.
We're sure it's the same guy."
UNKNOWN MALE DNA (SK)
(SK) BLOOD TYPE B
BLEND OF MALE DNA AND VICTIM'S DNA
UNKNOWN MALE DNA
"We must break the story."
I said, "I want to tell it."
He said, "Not yet!
You could ruin the investigation.
This guy's extremely dangerous.
I hope you never have to see a crime scene like these.
Please, this guy is on the loose,
I beg you, don't break the story yet."
I respected the deal.
I may be a reporter, but I'm a citizen above all.
I didn't want a rapist and woman-killer
roaming free and evading arrest
because of what I wrote.
There we were. He was at it again.
We had to act fast. It was a race against time.
CRIME LABORATORY
At the time, the forensics department
was in the dark ages.
I mean, seriously.
The crime scene analysts who took samples at the scenes
were a bunch of drunks and losers
who'd been put out to pasture.
It should have been cutting-edge, but it wasn't.
LABORATORY OF MOLECULAR GENETICS
To make up for these shortcomings,
the Crime Brigade turned to Dr. Pascal,
who pioneered DNA research in France.
PASCAL O. HOSPITAL DOCTOR
Ms. Monteil and the Crime Brigade completely trusted Dr. Pascal.
He analyzed, case by case,
samples taken from crime scenes.
Traces of sperm, blood and hair.
He compared those with the unknown DNA
which Dr. Pascal named "SK"…
MALE DNA (SK)
…because it was the first serial killer DNA in France.
He fought alongside the Crime Brigade
to establish a DNA database.
Many French people opposed it.
The idea of it frightened them.
This DNA database
is a dangerous precedent.
It could lead to a national DNA database.
-A slippery slope. -Your DNA, your history…
I completely agree with you.
I oppose that database!
OUTSIDE 12 RUE DE LA FORGE ROYALE PARIS 11TH ARRONDISSEMENT
POLICE STATEMENT
On November 16, 1997,
another victim was discovered in the 11th arrondissement.
25 YEARS OLD SECRETARY
Look how beautiful she was.
The others too. They were all so pretty.
It's truly…
My God.
A life torn apart.
It's horrible.
Her name was Estelle Magd.
Her parents had a key to her apartment.
When she didn't answer, they went over
and found their daughter
naked and bloody.
She had the same neck wounds and punctures.
We found the same lacerated clothing.
It was…
For me, it was a signature. Very clearly.
DISCOVERY OF BAG WITH GREY T-SHIRT
We found a sweatshirt.
A size large sweatshirt, splattered with blood.
We were sure to find DNA.
The sweatshirt was covered with blood and sweat.
We matched it with the other cases where we'd found DNA.
I couldn't say anything.
I understand perfectly well
that it was the police's duty
to preserve secrecy. I respected that.
One hundred percent.
But when you have two girls
murdered the same way
as my own daughter,
then I said,
"The media."
I can confirm that by late July '95,
the authorities knew they were up against a serial killer.
An extremely dangerous man
who, like any serial killer,
could kill again.
There's a serial killer in Paris.
-…serial killer. -…serial killer…
The East Paris serial killer…
The police sketch based on the statement
of another woman who escaped the same sort of attack.
Anne Gautier, a mother and her family, meet with the judge.
They want to know if police will finally arrest
the serial killer who murdered Hélène.
Will they catch him? I hope so.
We continue to hope.
You can't fully grieve
until justice is done.
Anne Gautier is very angry. She says,
"These two last deaths,
Magali Sirotti and Estelle Magd should never have happened.
It's a scandal and I'm speaking out now
to warn the women of Paris to protect themselves
not to fall prey to this predator."
A serial killer can't stop.
He won't stop until he is arrested.
FEAR IN THE CITY
People are talking, they're scared.
They're buying the paper to see the police sketch.
They want to help move things forward and catch him.
Paris was hysterical.
The revelation of a serial killer in East Paris
along with the press coverage of Anne Gautier
meant that the women of Paris were scared.
I'm pretty worried.
When I enter my building,
I make sure I close the door behind me.
The electronic message boards in Paris
warned women, "Don't go home alone.
Get someone to take you, a taxi or a friend…"
A detective told me, "Patricia, be careful.
If your door takes 15 seconds to close
a guy can slip in."
FEAR IN BASTILLE
I'll admit
I wasn't pleased about it getting out.
It was hysteria.
It is what it is.
France doesn't have very many serial killers.
This isn't the United States.
It got a lot of press, people ate it up. The ball was rolling.
The police have a sketch of a 30-year-old man with dark hair.
Several details link past cases to those of today.
Police are wary,
sex crimes and murder are rare in Paris,
until now.
The term "serial killer" itself
was taboo for them at the time.
Dr. Pascal named the DNA "SK"
but the cops didn't use that term.
This + this + this = serial killer.
But in France we think we're smart
so it simply can't be a serial killer.
We don't have those here.
It was too reminiscent
of American serial killers who are very different
with much longer series.
They didn't fully grasp
in terms of psychology or the investigation
what a serial killer actually is.
So we had no DNA database,
we had no notion of the psychology of a serial killer.
On top of that,
there was no cross-referencing in France.
The files were scattered throughout every city and courthouse.
Some things weren't working, some were a total mess.
In January '98,
the Crime Brigade released a photo
of an XXL grey sweatshirt.
That sweatshirt was shown everywhere.
"If you know anyone with a sweatshirt like this, call us."
When you're reduced to showing a sweatshirt that could be anyone's,
you're grasping at straws.
I was under pressure
and rightly so, as head of the Crime Brigade.
I kept saying over and over,
I also wanted to press for the creation of a DNA database.
MALE DNA (SK)
OFFICE OF JUDGE THIEL FIRST EXAMINING MAGISTRATE
Judge Thiel and I saw each other often.
He said,
"We need to hit all the labs,
take everything we can,
then run matches.
Force them to run matches
with the serial killer's DNA."
The central authorities were shocked.
They said we weren't allowed to look for matches.
They had no database. I gave them a piece of my mind.
It was such a disgrace.
I said, "You'd rather have deaths on your conscience?"
Because if we were quick and efficient,
we could look for matches
and maybe even get a name.
Yes, we skirted the law. We were all fine with that.
The ends justified the means.
We weren't violating French people's identity.
We weren't doing evil things.
We were after a serial killer targeting young women.
We already had too many of these cases.
We had to do everything we could to stop him.
We open up a file,
we read the genetic code
and compare it to the unknown DNA.
VOICE OF DR. PASCAL
If the numbers are different, we put it back,
take another one and start over.
Is there a way to cross-check the files?
No, unfortunately without a database
each file is stored individually and must be checked one by one
in order to find the genetic code.
JANUARY 1998 FEBRUARY 1998
MARCH 1998
It was March 24, 1998.
I got a call from Dr. Pascal.
My heart jumped. I thought, "Oh my God!"
It's not like we never saw each other around headquarters.
But I could tell something was up.
He said, "I have good and bad news."
I said, "Give me the good news!"
He said, "We've identified him."
IDENTIFICATION OF UNKNOWN MALE DNA
DNA OF GUY GEORGES
FROM THE CIGARETTE BUTT
VAGINAL SWABS
MALE DNA: GUY GEORGES
It was…
a deliverance. Such a sense of relief.
An indescribable deliverance.
DNA OF GUY GEORGES
DOCTOR O. PASCAL HOSPITAL OF NANTES
"And," he said,
"the bad news is…
the killer had already been brought in back in 1995."
And that…
that was a shock indeed.
At the time, he'd been questioned mainly
by a team handling cases
of girls murdered in parking lots.
If you dig a little you can find
a few similarities,
but why were some in garages and others in apartments?
There were clues, the wounds and slashed clothes.
27 YEARS OLD MARKETING ASSISTANT
There was no sperm, but he could have used a condom.
22 YEARS OLD PRESS SECRETARY
We had the firm conviction it was him,
the investigators were pretty sure.
And there was a much older case, from 1991.
Pascale Escarfail.
CLOTHES, WOUNDS, BLOOD
BODY OF PASCALE ESCARFAIL
19 YEARS OLD STUDENT
I said, "We'll deal with that later. We'll debrief later.
Right now the important thing is hunting down this beast."
I distributed his photo throughout the country.
We had to act fast.
The predator was prowling the city.
My obsession was to arrest him in a matter of hours.
I asked for extra manpower and we drew up a list
of addresses and places where we were likely
to encounter Guy Georges.
I had another urgent mission.
I told the unit leader
we had to call the victims' families.
I got a call from Ms. Monteil.
"Mrs. Gautier, we've got a name.
But don't tell anyone,
not your children or anyone else."
I got that.
They were out looking for him.
Let's hope he doesn't kill again.
There was such media hype surrounding the case.
The press could obviously sense
a certain energy and commotion.
Police Headquarters were buzzing with activity.
They sensed it.
The boss said, "The press knows."
And I said, "Please! Please keep them quiet!
Please, no leaks!"
MARCH 26, 1998 7:01 AM
The East Paris serial killer now has a face.
A manhunt is underway. Stay tuned.
The East Paris Serial Killer had been identified.
The Crime Brigade knew his name: Guy Georges.
Then, the shock!
A crime reporter, like me,
revealed the killer's name before he was arrested.
You simply don't do that.
Imagine if Guy Georges had heard that.
On TV or the radio or wherever.
He could flee and jeopardize the manhunt.
But we kept at it.
You have to realize, Police Headquarters is a war machine.
Evading us is not that easy.
I was optimistic we'd find him.
I knew we would.
THE SAME DAY 12:44 PM
There were two officers on a stakeout
that morning at the Blanche metro stop.
They were already there in place.
They see this guy leave the metro.
One says to the other,
"Look! Look!
It's the guy from the photo."
They take it out. "Gosh, it's him! Let's go!"
They grabbed him and made an arrest.
GROCERY STORE WHERE GUY GEORGES WAS ARRESTED
SECURITY GUARD WHO WITNESSED THE ARREST
POINTING TO WHERE IT HAPPENED
He came in this morning.
The police followed him in and asked for his name.
They leapt on him.
They brought him here and forced him to his knees.
Then they took him away.
DNA tests are conclusive,
implicating him in three murders and one murder attempt.
Yet Guy Georges looks nothing like the police sketch
widely published for months.
There have been enough deaths and suffering.
This is good.
Now he'll be judged.
And we, the families,
we can truly begin grieving.
This man had caused so much pain.
My God.
You had to take a deep breath.
I thought, "he's the monster who killed them."
I kept seeing the photos of the girls.
All those photos.
For me, it was a monster
who climbed the stairs that day.
A true monster.
It's all I could think.
Behold the new portrait of Guy Georges,
arrested yesterday for the murder of three women in East Paris.
Today, he admitted to two others.
Police suspect his involvement in two additional murders.
We'd done our job. We had him, he couldn't kill anymore.
For the cases with DNA, we could rest easy.
When it came down to it,
he'd left evidence.
All we needed was a confession
for the cases with no DNA.
We had this guy.
I wondered what lawyer, however talented,
could debunk the case. We went to court confident.
ACT 2 JUDGMENT
I REALIZE I'M SPEAKING TO YOU OPENLY,
AS IF YOU WERE MY FRIEND.
MARCH 19, 2001
A sexual criminal is innocent until proven guilty.
For me it's about personality.
Either I want to defend someone or I don't.
It's a matter of chemistry.
There's no rhyme or reason to it.
We've all been in the situation
where we meet someone new
and they make a bad impression on us.
We think how we would never want
to find ourselves alone with them.
That wasn't the case.
When you meet Guy Georges, he doesn't come across as manipulative.
You think he's an open book.
He has no hidden agenda, he's not devious.
And not violent.
DAY 1 OF THE TRIAL
-You can take your sweater off. -Okay.
-Look at me though. -What?
-Look at me. -Yes, but it's hard.
-May I sit down? -Yes, go ahead.
Guy Georges' trusted lawyer
was Alex Ursulet.
Alex Ursulet,
who is my ex-husband,
asked me to join him on the case a few weeks before the trial.
Putting a woman on the case
was no doubt part of the defense strategy
devised by Alex Ursulet
or any male lawyer when it comes to rape cases.
It's just elementary.
He presented the case
as a man who was unjustly accused.
Evidence had been found at each crime scene.
Some of this evidence cleared Guy Georges.
For instance,
his handprints were never found.
At one crime scene there was a print
from an Egyptian foot, which he does not have.
The police sketch distributed for months
looked nothing like Guy Georges.
POLICE SKETCH 97/225
On principle,
what I think is of no interest.
I consider it strictly irrelevant.
What matters is what's in the file.
My gut feeling of whether I believe he's guilty or not,
my personal conviction is of no interest.
Guy Georges isn't a monster, he's a man.
That's the problem.
Inside Guy Georges
there's the same humanity I have inside me.
Inside you. Inside all of us.
That's the terrifying part.
A monster would be easier.
The problem is we're cut from the same cloth.
And that's what is so painful.
That's the great mystery.
And the real tragedy.
He's not a monster, but a man.
I was 30.
It was my 2nd major trial
as a lawyer.
But this time I was defending the victims.
He must stop doing harm.
Justice must be served, period.
We know it's him because there is evidence.
It's not a crazy hunch or suspicion. We know it's him.
We also know juries are easily swayed.
If he'd admitted in court,
"Where they found my DNA, that was me. But not the others."
I worried the jury would sentence him for the cases with DNA,
but acquit him for those without.
That would have been intolerable.
Because it wasn't the truth.
There was that tension.
It was really tough.
I sat here in the first row.
I wanted Guy Georges in my line of sight.
I wanted to see his reactions and write it all down.
Everything that happened.
Names, attitudes…
I didn't want to miss a thing.
It was going to be a war between the two sides.
Alex Ursulet swore to me right before the trial
that Guy Georges was innocent.
There'd been a judicial error.
He said, "Patricia, I'll prove it in court.
I swear to God that Guy Georges is innocent."
I never wanted to go to the trial.
That wasn't for me.
My goal was to get him arrested and sent to trial.
But it wasn't for me.
DAY 2
Outside the courthouse, the crowd gets bigger each day.
Inside the courtroom, the tension rises.
In the dock, Guy Georges, alleged rapist-killer of seven women,
angers the victims' families.
All week, he's replied to the judge with the same insolence,
"I did not kill."
I see that there is no limit to Guy Georges' perversion.
CATHY'S MOTHER
Through his attitude, he continues
to do harm and cause damage.
To the victims and their families
who are extremely vulnerable and in pain.
To think he denied it.
It was absolutely shocking.
You wondered…
Was it bad advice or was he crazy?
We simply didn't get it.
We were surprised, but serene.
After all, he'd confessed to everything.
VICTIM: MAGALI SIROTTI
I WANT TO EASE MY CONSCIENCE
VICTIM: CATHERINE ROCHER
I AM THE ATTACKER
THE WHOLE TRUTH OF THIS CASE
Even in the cases with no evidence: Escarfail,
Magali Sirotti…
He confessed to everything.
GUY GEORGES' STATEMENT
FRANCIS BECHET POLICE CAPTAIN
Officer Francis Bechet,
a.k.a. Sidney,
was the first to get Guy Georges to confess.
Sidney was up at the stand.
He'd already told me the story of how he got Guy Georges to confess.
He didn't say this in court, but to get Guy Georges to talk,
Sidney knew he mustn't be made to feel,
right after his arrest,
like Public Enemy No.1.
So Sidney
created an atmosphere
in his office at headquarters.
He put on some jazz music.
He offered him some whiskey.
Then he started chatting with Guy Georges
in a very informal way.
A BLOND GIRL…
CAUGHT MY EYE…
Guy Georges gave him a confession
bursting with details. He told him everything.
Like…
like a confidant.
He bought an Opinel 12 knife
and some duct tape.
He was finishing a beer
when a young woman walked by all dressed in black.
Blond, 19 years old, pretty as a picture.
Guy Georges tells Sidney
he was attracted to the pretty girl.
He left right away and followed the girl.
He went upstairs behind her,
held her at knife-point and spent hours with her.
Pascale was a heroine.
She kicked him.
She was five foot three.
19 years old, tied up, naked
and she kicked him.
And…
it made Guy Georges mad.
And…
her mouth, when they found her,
when the police found her,
wasn't gagged, but the tape had left marks.
Her mouth was open.
Sidney, the cop,
had asked himself repeatedly during the seven-year manhunt,
"What was she saying?
What were Pascale's last words as she died?"
And Guy Georges says,
"The tape came loose.
She looked at me and asked, 'What are you doing?
Are you killing me?'"
And that…
Sidney was blown to bits by what he'd heard.
A victim's final words in the mouth of her killer.
Sidney asked what he did after that.
"I washed my hands in the kitchen sink.
I saw some beers so I drank one.
I took another and left."
DAY 3
Sometimes innocent men confess in custody.
You think people never confess then retract?
You'll see, when we examine it
case by case,
how they created a culprit.
They exaggerated and blamed him
for nearly all the crimes that took place at a time
when he could have committed them because he wasn't in jail.
He'd always maintained that his arrest had been violent.
When he was brought in to police headquarters,
he was made to climb the stairs.
He said he was beaten then.
And later, in custody.
Don't forget, back then, no lawyers were present
and it wasn't filmed.
He said he was pressured into confessing.
To things he didn't do.
He was never beaten!
He had one very minor head injury,
sustained during arrest.
End of story. The rest of the time,
it was a psychological "game."
A psychological game between the investigators and him
to get a confession.
That's all.
You don't need to beat a man to get a confession.
He's taunting us.
Taunting the court, everyone.
We see him sitting there. It's unbelievable.
The victims' families
were expecting Guy Georges to be sentenced.
But they needed to hear it,
and hear Guy Georges explain.
Answer the questions they still had
about the final moments of their daughters or sisters.
I don't know how to describe it.
A monster.
ELSA'S MOTHER
Zero reaction.
When he looked at the photos, nothing.
It's crazy.
I looked at the photos from each crime scene.
That was an unbearable part of the trial.
Guy Georges didn't flip through the photos.
Guy Georges looked at them
one by one.
He examined them attentively, calmly.
But very focused. Distant.
He looked at them all, he studied each one.
It was…
It was chilling.
We looked at them for maybe 20 seconds.
But him? I timed it.
I said, "Guy Georges,
you looked at the photos for five minutes, 40 seconds. I timed it.
If the question wasn't specific, he wouldn't answer.
He'd say, "No, not at all. How do you know that?"
So my question was clear.
"You looked at the photos for five minutes, 40 seconds?"
And he went…
"I dunno. It is what it is."
He didn't even say
that he was surprised, or trying to analyze them.
He said it wasn't him, but he couldn't say why he looked.
I pressed the issue.
I wasn't satisfied with his answer and didn't sit down.
Then he said…
"It hurts."
I asked, "How do you hide it so well?"
Obviously, he didn't reply.
DAY 4
CRIMINAL COURT LAWYERS' ENTRANCE
We need to have people,
men or women, I'm not a feminist,
who attempt to defend what some might call indefensible.
No. Nothing is indefensible. This is proof.
It's terrifying.
It was a terrifying case.
But he's a human being.
WITHOUT REALIZING IT,
I CALLED YOU 'MOM' TWICE
I'm so struck by his childhood.
He was born out of wedlock
to a young woman and a passing soldier.
…TO CONSIDER YOUR CHILD "ABANDONED"…
DECLARATION OF ABANDONMENT
CHILD PUT UP FOR ADOPTION
WARD OF THE STATE
He was rejected again and again.
Guy Georges quickly ended up
with Child Services.
He was placed with the Morin family.
And this family
was as loving and supportive as can be expected
when you have practically 20 children.
In other words, seven biological children
and 13 foster children.
What happened after the age of 16?
He…
He attacked a girl from behind.
He tried to choke her.
Jeanne Morin came through the witness door.
WITNESSES FOR THE CRIMINAL COURT
She went to the stand.
She'd come to explain
Guy Georges' childhood and why she finally rejected him
after Guy Georges assaulted his two foster sisters.
One when he was 14,
the other, Christiane,
with a metal rod against her throat.
Guy Georges was 15 or 16.
Mrs. Morin said it was a wake-up call.
She called the social worker and Child Services.
She sent Guy Georges away.
He was sent to a group home.
He became a runaway, a delinquent.
And it just went downhill from there.
The amazing thing
was you could see Guy Georges was touched,
moved by this elderly woman.
At one point he said to her,
"Mom,
I want to tell you, I love you."
And Mrs. Morin turned to him
and said, "I love you, too.
But now my heart is drained."
And then…
Guy Georges' face falls. He sits back down.
She didn't love him anymore.
No way.
Guy Georges doesn't move me at all as a woman.
Moved?
You mean touched?
No.
Of course he had a tragic life. No question.
But he was free, he acted freely.
What Guy Georges did was insane, but he's not.
He's free. Free not to do it.
He knew it was wrong. Evil.
So I'm not moved at all. Enough already.
I'm moved by the pain of the victims I defend.
DAY 5
I hope he has the guts to admit,
as he did during the investigation,
what happened, because it is the only way
for us to understand these atrocious deeds
and for him to be able to look himself in the mirror.
By Day 5, we were overwhelmed.
Overwhelmed by pain.
What I wanted
was for Guy Georges to contradict himself
so I could be positive
he'd be convicted for Pascale Escarfail's murder too,
even though no evidence tied him to it.
So from the start of the trial
I would question him every time
I saw him getting tripped up.
Then I noticed something.
Something very unusual, at lunchtime.
I wanted to question Guy Georges about it
before the end of the day.
It was about 6:00 p.m.
I decided to
cross-examine him.
I was given the floor.
I stood up.
Guy Georges.
You heard the clothing expert earlier
explain that
the knife that slashed the clothes
was held by someone left-handed.
You told us you were right-handed.
Isn't that right?
Guy Georges says yes.
Guy Georges,
are you sure you're right-handed?
You never use your left hand?
He says no.
Guy Georges, I insist.
You do everything right-handed?
You don't use both hands? You're not ambidextrous?
He answers no.
Guy Georges,
I'm surprised.
Because, here's the thing…
I watched carefully.
When you're handed photos,
you take them with your right hand.
But when you look through them,
you do it like this, with your left hand.
And you move the microphone with your left hand.
So…
Suddenly,
he looks at me and says,
"That's because…
"It's logical…
"The photos, the mic…
"But…"
And he raises his hand: "But…"
But what, Guy Georges?
You strike with your right hand?
He says yes.
And when you stab, do you use your right hand?
Guy Georges says yes.
He starts to realize what he's just done.
He completely changes.
His smile turns into a sneer.
He's furious at himself and at Solange Doumic.
He looks daggers at her.
He lowers his hand.
The courtroom is deathly quiet.
He'd just confessed, he'd acted it out.
We saw him.
We saw the true Guy Georges, he wasn't the man from before.
At that moment, you really felt
the violence. Guy Georges the killer.
Thank you.
So, at that moment,
I turned to Guy Georges
and asked him,
"What were you talking about? What did you mean?"
We all expected him to say,
"In street fights…"
The regular old Guy Georges from the last five days.
From his chair,
he literally jumped to his feet to answer. Like this.
And he shouts, pointing at me,
his face twisted by hatred.
He shouts,
"She's the one! She trapped me! It's a game to her!"
And Doumic replies,
"No, it's not a game."
There's too much pain and suffering here.
"But," she says, "I consider it a confession
when for 15 seconds you seemed to say, I'll kill you.'"
I started to lose it.
I burst into tears.
Luckily I had my hair.
But it all came out. Court adjourned.
So in a room in the back we were able to see him,
obviously surrounded by guards, but they stood back
so we could talk in private.
But…
Guy Georges was in no state to talk.
It wasn't the same Guy Georges.
This wasn't the man from earlier in the trial.
I felt like I was speaking
to a twisted iron bar.
And I felt all this violence
was going to explode, possibly at me.
Because I think it was blind rage.
The guards must have felt the same thing.
Because for the first time
one of them sat between me and Guy Georges.
I felt I was meeting
the Guy Georges the victims saw.
The sense of ruin
surrounding this case suddenly hit me.
All these ruined lives around me.
Guy Georges' ruined life. His life was ruined from the start.
That's undeniable.
And…
It was nothing but pain and ruin.
DAY 6
When the trial resumed Monday morning on Day 6,
everyone was convinced Guy Georges was going to talk.
We're all waiting and nothing happens. The stand is empty.
He refused to leave jail that morning.
So the judge
ordered him out by force
so he'd come to his trial.
He was in a foul mood.
He turned up unshaven,
unkempt, extremely angry.
The judge tried to resume the trial.
"Guy Georges, when we left off Friday evening,
you had things to say to the families.
Are you ready to talk now?"
Guy Georges says, "No, not now.
I'll talk to the families, but not like this.
I piss on justice."
DAY 7
It's him. No surprise there.
ELSA'S MOTHER
You try to tell yourself that he's human,
but, in fact, he's not.
I didn't really know if Guy Georges would talk,
but I kept thinking…
I hope we don't have a repeat of last week.
At that point, the only thing
that Alex Ursulet and I hoped
was that he could truly explain himself,
so no one could tell us, "he's a monster."
We needed to understand why he did it.
He had to do at least that.
It was a matter of morality with regard to his deeds.
At the very least, he needed to find the fortitude
before the court and families to explain it.
He's on his feet.
If he's a human being, then he's able to stand up and say,
"Yes, I did that."
Tuesday afternoon,
Guy Georges had changed.
He'd shaved his head.
He traded his green tracksuit
for an immaculate white sweater.
In comes Elisabeth, who'd escaped him in '95.
Stunning, long red hair.
She's led straight before Guy Georges and she waits.
Alex leaned close to Guy Georges and told him,
"If you have something to say, now's the time.
Say it for your family.
Tell us, did you attack Elisabeth?"
And Guy Georges says yes.
He looks down and says yes.
We barely heard it. It was a whisper.
Ursulet continues. He says,
"Are you the one who killed Ms. Escarfail?"
"Yes."
"Did you kill Cathy Rocher?"
"Yes."
It was like a litany.
Ursulet listed the names of each victim.
"Did you kill Ms. Sirotti, Ms. Bénady…"
"Yes, yes, yes."
Those yeses came from deep down.
At that moment, the courtroom was dead silent.
Not so much as a fly buzzed in that courtroom.
The only thing
we heard after Guy Georges had spoken,
were the words of one of the victims' mothers
who said thank you.
I spoke the words, "Thank you."
And he nodded.
CATHY'S MOTHER
And right now I'm reeling
from this non-conversation
in which I thanked my daughter's killer.
But it just came out.
There was no thought behind it.
Judging by the victims, Guy Georges targeted
women between 19 and 32. A wide range.
There was no special physical style.
Brunettes, blondes, redheads.
Tall and short.
Not one was depressed, unemployed, lonely…
or down.
They were grounded women with ambitions, boyfriends…
He told us it was their energy that triggered him.
The more energetic they were, the more he was drawn to them.
He said that,
when he saw them in the street,
it was the energy they gave off that attracted him.
It was this energy he found magnetic,
that awoke him.
DAY 13
It was unexpected.
It didn't go as planned.
We decided
we had to see him through until the end.
If I hadn't stuck with it and pleaded for him,
for Guy Georges it would've meant
I was abandoning him.
Yet another woman was abandoning him.
That was unbearable.
So obviously I pleaded.
Your Honor.
Ladies and gentlemen of the court and jury.
This afternoon,
I'm the first to stand before you,
and plead in defense of Mr. Guy Georges.
To plead in defense of the indefensible.
I would like to address you, Guy Georges.
I'd like to say
that you may be a psychopath,
but you were not born that way.
One is not born a psychopath, one becomes one.
The verdict will be no surprise.
And…
I don't know what your future holds.
Your future will be different.
But inventing that future is up to you.
DAY 14 FINAL DAY OF THE TRIAL
The trial resumed at 4:42 pm.
The judge announced the verdict of the Paris Criminal Court.
"Mr. Guy Georges,
you are sentenced to life in prison
with a minimum of 22 years."
There's hugging and kissing in the courtroom.
You could even hear laughter among the defendants.
And it's over.
EPILOGUE
I OWE YOU SO MUCH
BECAUSE I TOOK SO MUCH FROM YOU.
DON'T FEEL SAD WE ARE LISTENING TO THE BIRDS
Since I wasn't at the trial,
I heard it afterwards. It was very emotional for me.
He asked the victims for forgiveness.
And since I wasn't there,
I thought about forgiveness and all that.
And I realized that no, I couldn't forgive him.
He didn't attack me, he attacked Hélène.
And so…
I decided I'd write to him.
And he wrote back.
MY DEAR ANNE,
I DON'T WANT TO LIE TO YOU,
I DIDN'T SLEEP EITHER ON THE NIGHT OF JULY 7-8.
I REALIZE I'M SPEAKING TO YOU OPENLY,
AS IF YOU WERE MY FRIEND.
I OWE YOU SO MUCH,
BECAUSE I TOOK SO MUCH FROM YOU.
She entrusted me with his letters,
like a legacy.
She also asked me
to see if the letters might be used
by psychiatrists to comprehend Guy Georges.
To see him as more than a killer, as someone intelligent
with an understanding of who he is and where he came from.
I WON'T LOSE HOPE
STRAIGHT TO JAIL
TELL ME WHAT TO DO
I think we can learn from Guy Georges' letters
so that other Guy Georgeses, and there are many,
don't actually take action. That's what matters today.
AN OUNCE OF PREVENTION
How to recognize and help them
handle their pain in other ways than by committing horrors.
THAT'S KIND OF YOU, ANNE
It's very unusual
for a mother to write to her daughter's murderer.
Because she believes in redemption.
Anne believes that Guy Georges
can still be saved.
That he can be treated,
undergo therapy, work through it.
I think she believes in that.
This is a walnut tree.
It has suffered too. It's been cut.
It's beautiful. Hélène.
I want to share
knowledge, hard work, generosity and all that.
I don't want to share hate. Absolutely not.
It's not my thing.
Here. A souvenir for you.
There aren't many.
This here…
This is peace.
You take your sorrow and make something with it.
That's what I want to share.
THANKS TO THE PERSISTENCE OF THE VICTIMS' FAMILIES,
FRANCE FINALLY ACQUIRED A DNA DATABASE IN 1998,
ALLOWING FOR THE RESOLUTION OF HUNDREDS OF CASES.
Subtitle translation by Michelle Noteboom, Sionann O'Neill, and David Pickering