If it is not yet the epilogue - several trials are still to come - it is an essential chapter of the "Magali Blandin affair" which ended on the night of Sunday October 31st to Monday 1st. November, a little before 4 a.m., in a medico-psychological unit in Vezin-le-Coquet prison, near Rennes.
The main suspect in the assassination of Magali Blandin, her own husband, killed himself in his cell, in the face and beard of the guards, who nevertheless increased the rounds to keep an eye on this detainee with psychological health brittle.
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Incarcerated in pre-trial detention since his confession on March 19, 2020, Jérôme Gaillard hanged himself from the bars of the small window of his cell - probably using a scrap of sheet.
The latter had also started a hunger strike three weeks earlier - "
his last fight
", according to his lawyer, Me Jean-Guillaume le Mintier, in
Paris
.
The 40-year-old wanted his children, “
his reason for living
”, to be reunited by social services.
On the table in his cell, a farewell letter and a handwritten note entitled "
will
" were found.
These last words will perhaps shed light on the many gray areas hovering over the drama and the way it was orchestrated.
A disappearance that intrigues as much as it worries
Saturday February 13, 2021, France discovers the existence of a certain Magali Blandin, "
light brown hair at mid-length, five feet high and athletic build
", according to the portrait drawn up by the gendarmes.
This 42-year-old woman, a specialist educator and mother of four children, has been missing since the day before in Montfort-sur-Meu, near Rennes.
It was a colleague who sounded the alarm, worried that she would not show up for work.
Magali also did not go to school, where she was to pick up her children.
A search notice is then distributed by the Ille-et-Vilaine gendarmerie and widely relayed by the press.
On February 18, the public prosecutor of Rennes, Philippe Astruc, decides to open an information for "
worrying disappearance
".
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In the weeks that follow, beatings are organized to find the mother of the family.
Hundreds of gendarmes are mobilized to comb an area of 10km².
Ponds and water holes are sounded, helicopters deployed as well as tracking dogs.
In vain.
A criminal and family conspiracy
A month later, on March 18, Jérôme Gaillard, the husband of the disappeared with whom she was in the process of divorce, was arrested and placed in police custody.
After 29 hours of hearing, the 45-year-old man breaks down and recognizes the premeditated murder of his wife on February 11.
He explains that he waited for her on his doorstep before hitting her twice with a baseball bat.
The next morning, he drove the gendarmes to Boisgervilly, just a few kilometers from the victim's home.
It is there, at the foot of a tree, in a wooded and snow-covered area and under several centimeters of earth, that Magali's body, covered with lime, is brought to light.
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The case could end there.
It was without counting on the words of the prosecutor of Rennes during a press conference on March 20, a few hours after the discovery of the body:
“The investigations made it possible to update a criminal project targeting Magali Blandin developed at the fall 2020. "
Little by little, a criminal and family plot takes shape.
It concerns first of all the parents of Jérôme Gaillard, whose active participation in the crime, as regards the preparations for it - at least - is no longer in doubt.
Monique and Jean Gaillard, 72 and 75, are indicted on Sunday March 21 for "
complicity in attempted murder by spouse
" and for "
complicity in murder by spouse
".
Both admitted to having helped their son in the organization of the assassination of his wife, in particular by lending him the sum of 50,000 euros to pay for the services of a hired killer.
Jérôme Gaillard's mother also bought quicklime at her son's request - it will be used to hide Magali Blandin's body.
Finally, Jean Gaillard served as an alibi for his son while he was murdering his wife by going to his home to use the internet and make calls.
Both imprisoned, they are awaiting trial.
"An old friend" and a scheduled performance
There remain the Georgians and the scheduled execution of Magali Blandin. From November 2020, barely two months after the couple separated, Jérôme Gaillard made contact with “
an old
Georgian
friend
”, a certain Giorgi Z. He was in fact one of his former tenants; Jérôme Gaillard did not work and lived on the rent of several sheds. It was initially a question of the sale of equipment, but, very quickly, the conversation turned around the marital setbacks of Jérôme Gaillard. His "
friend
" would then have assured him that if there was a "
problem to be solved
He knew people capable of taking care of it: Georgian acquaintances could execute his wife.
From mid-December, a first deposit of 8,000 euros would have been paid by Jérôme Gaillard.
It was also during this period that Jérôme received the 50,000 euros from his parents.
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The execution is then decided for the month of January 2021. The husband of Magali Blandin finally backtracked and gives up calling on the services of the Georgians.
This is where the machine gets carried away.
Giorgi would not have heard it that way and, sensing the right opportunity to make more money, he manages to extort 20,000 euros more from Jérôme Gaillard against his silence.
The money is returned in the form of two transfers.
Things stay there until the disappearance of Magali Blandin.
And then, just a few days after the crime, Jérôme Gaillard receives two threatening letters at home as well as a USB key which would contain three recordings in which he very clearly evokes his macabre plan.
Blackmail and extortion
A meeting is fixed in the middle of the night between Jerome and a Georgian - possibly Giorgi or one of his acquaintances. The 45-year-old man goes there with his parents' car, without a GPS or phone. He negotiates a period of 15 days to give this man the sum of 15,000 euros. The ransom remission is due to take place on March 14. In the meantime, Jérôme goes to the judge in charge of his wife's disappearance file and explains to him that he was the victim of blackmail and extortion. It is during this interview that the judge understands that the lonely husband is no stranger to the disappearance of Magali Blandin. The delivery of the ransom will take place on the agreed date, in the presence, however, of the gendarmes and men of the GIGN, who question and embark the whole small group. A total of four Georgians are in police custody. Giorgi,his wife, an accomplice as well as a tenant of Jérôme Gaillard, a scrap dealer suspected of having removed the car used to transport the body after the murder.
Giorgi and his accomplice are indicted for "
attempted organized gang extortion
" and "
organized gang murder
" and imprisoned.
The wife of the first is placed under judicial control.
The junkyard is for its part indicted for "
attempted extortion in an organized group in legal recidivism
" and "
destruction of evidence of a crime to obstruct the manifestation of the truth
" and imprisoned.
"Satisfy unacknowledged desires and fantasies"
Today many questions remain unanswered, including the main one: why did Jérôme Gaillard commit this murder? If several motives have been put forward - badly digested rupture or conflict over money - none seems serious enough to draw with certainty the contours of such a crime.
If it is customary to say that reality often exceeds fiction, here it would rather tend to flirt with. As proof, the scenario written in 2016 by Jérôme Gaillard which deals neither more nor less with a conjugal murder. He would tell the life of a schizophrenic who wishes "to
satisfy unacknowledged desires and fantasies, letting his criminal and destructive impulses express themselves
", according to France Bleu, who was able to obtain the outline of the manuscript. How well would the man have projected himself into his character? Only the conclusions of a college of experts could have answered this question which suggests a premeditated murder of a very long time.
The death of Jérôme Gaillard came to close the investigation from the point of view of his accusation, depriving the civil party of any trial.
The latter remains presumed innocent in the eyes of justice.
The three Georgians imprisoned as well as the parents of Jérôme Gaillard are meanwhile awaiting trial.