The trial of a 70-year-old retiree, accused of having killed his partner, whose body had been found dismembered and charred in a wood in 2017, opened on Monday March 6 before the Assize Court of Yvelines.
On August 31, 2017, pieces of burned bodies were found on a pedestrian path in Vernouillet, about forty kilometers west of Paris.
Using a knife and saw
It will take nearly two years for investigators to identify them, in May 2019: the victim is a sexagenarian, reported missing by his companion on October 16, 2017. Philippe Marchand made his first confession before his indictment and his placement in pre-trial detention in October 2019. He then recounted having strangled his companion at home, assuring that she was violent and jealous and had also sought to strangle him.
He also admitted to using a knife and saw to dismember the victim's body, and cutting off the fingertips to erase his fingerprints.
The accused would then have transported the dismembered body in the night, in bags of rubble, to a wood in Vernouillet where he would have burned it.
During the investigation, he explained that he had sent text messages from the victim's phone to himself and to members of his family, between his death and the report of his disappearance.
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The retiree is also suspected of having used the victim's bank accounts for more than a year after his disappearance.
According to the investigation, more than 28,000 euros were debited from the account of the deceased.
Philippe Marchand and the victim had been in a relationship since December 2015. A former taxi driver, he had no particular pathology, according to an expert.
He was in a relationship with another woman before his girlfriend disappeared.
The victim's son and grandson are civil parties.
The verdict is expected Friday.
