Two more years for "the rapist on the watch" and a maximum sentence.
Charles C., 40 years old today, from Taverny (Val-d'Oise), was sentenced Thursday evening on appeal by the Assize Court in Versailles, to twenty years of criminal imprisonment.
A sentence with a safety period of twelve years, as in the first trial.
The court also pronounced an eight-year socio-judicial follow-up.
Period during which the convicted person, on release from prison, will have to undergo treatment under penalty of returning to prison.
A need underlined at the end of the trial at first instance: "If care is not put in place, it will remain dangerous", estimated the general counsel at the time.
"The victims were still all in shock, still crying at the hearing despite the time that has elapsed since the facts which are old for some of them", underlines Me Christian Gallon, the lawyer of a teenage victim of the accused, in Eragny, in 2015. As in the Pontoise trial, the prosecution drew up the terrible list of crimes committed by the man whom the prosecution had described as a “sexual predator”.
Victims aged 12 to 31
Coming from the community of Travelers, he was found guilty of all the acts with which he was accused: rape, attempts and sexual assault, some of 15-year-old minors.
The first fact dates back to October 8, 2003. The victim of this first sexual assault was only 12 years old.
The facts were then repeated over the months in Pontoise, Osny, Montigny and finally Eragny, in the Val-d'Oise, but also in an underground passage for pedestrians in Pecq (Yvelines), under the N 13, as well as 'in Beauvais (Oise) and Douai (North), on the banks of the Scarpe, depending on the movements of the accused who was a pruner.
The lost watch ploy
He attacked teenage girls aged 12 to 19, as well as a 31-year-old jogger.
Launched in search of him, the police had nicknamed him "the rapist with the watch", in reference to the stratagem of the lost watch.
A watch he says he has lost, inviting his victim to help him find it.
Then, gagging her mouth with his hand, he threatens her with death, indicating that he has a knife in his pocket, before taking action.
The court also confirmed his guilt for the assault of a teenage girl in 2015, in Eragny, while he had nevertheless assured to control his impulses since 2007 by resorting to prostitutes.
A victim who had formally recognized him on a photo, after having viewed 626 faces of suspects.
Numerous investigations had been carried out by the police: systematic neighborhood surveys, robotic portraits, psycho criminological analyzes, genetic samples in large numbers… A vast campaign to compare DNA profiles was carried out, then extended to the Union European.
The investigators of the judicial police had been able to establish his genetic profile, but it does not correspond to anyone known in the files.
An automated portrait and genetic profile established
In 2010, two analyzes made it possible to draw a first portrait of the author, described as a man who wanders during his lunch hours, perhaps a pruner.
A genetic robot portrait has even been established from his DNA profile to obtain a close physical description.
A comparative analysis of the cases also oriented the police officers on the community of Travelers, the investigation of the relations of one of the victims making it possible to target two cousins, including Charles C., attached to the municipality of Taverny, who has was taken into police custody on December 12, 2016.
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A last connection in this case had been made: the kidnapping committed in Eragny in 2015 of a 12-year-old schoolgirl who had managed to narrowly escape her predator.
A man living as a couple, father of a boy, actually working in the pruning.
