Until the end, he will have walled himself in his silence, alternating between phases of denial and others where he tried to confess without ever succeeding.
Olivier B., 59, was tried since Tuesday by the Oise Assize Court for facts dating back to the end of 2019.
Present before the jurors to answer for the facts of the murder of his friend and neighbor, he was sentenced this Wednesday to fifteen years of criminal imprisonment.
The Advocate General had requested twenty years.
The alteration of his discernment was retained by the court because of his strong state of alcoholism at the time of the events.
"It's not easy to recognize that you killed your best friend"
The case had caused a stir in the town of Gouvieux, renowned for its calm.
This Thursday, October 31, 2019, the gendarmes intervene around 10:40 p.m. in the small rue de la Planchette, called by neighbors who had heard cries coming from a ground floor apartment.
On the spot, a 55-year-old man lies on the ground in a pool of blood, victim of stab wounds.
It is already too late and the emergency services will not be able to do anything for him.
Near the scene of the tragedy, an individual was reported and quickly arrested.
However, his state of alcoholic impregnation will not allow the police to question him.
Before the Assize Court, Olivier B., 59, is doing better after three years of forced withdrawal during his pre-trial detention pending trial.
However, he did not make the confessions expected by the victim's family.
Read alsoAssises de l'Oise: Muhittin Ulug sentenced to 20 years in prison for the murder of Julien Videlaine
“I managed to jostle him a little, to make him say that it was hard for him to confess the facts but no more, details Maxime Gallier, the lawyer for the daughter and the sister of the victim.
My clients regretted that he did not go to the end.
They keep a bitter taste of not having heard him apologize but it is not easy to recognize that one killed his best friend.
»
A verdict which nevertheless satisfies the civil parties.
“They were waiting for this conviction which replaces the silence in which the accused immersed himself during these two days of hearing, points out the lawyer.
He was not ready to take on the murderer's costume, it was the Assize Court that did it for him.
»
