On the first day of his trial, his mother urged him between heavy sobs to "answer questions, say what happened." But in the box, Gabriel Fortin remained impassive, his back bent, half of his face hidden behind the woodwork of the assize court. The accused had "nothing to say." During two weeks of debates in which he refused to take part, nothing made him flinch. Nor the hearing of his only brother, who called him a "psychopath". Nor the "descent into hell" exposed by the relatives of the victims since the triple murder and the assassination attempt in the winter of 2021 between the Drôme and Alsace. At the end of two weeks of hearing, this "wall of indifference" was sentenced this Wednesday evening in Valencia to life imprisonment, accompanied by a security sentence of 22 years. The court also upheld the alteration of Gabriel Fortin's discernment pleaded by the defence.
"It's always other people's fault"
The court thought it was a jolt when, after two and a half years of silence, the accused stood up at the opening of the trial to proclaim loud and clear, three times, a text scribbled on a sheet: "I wish to say that it is a lot of lies, in the continuity of the facts of which I was a victim. I sent many complaints to the prosecutors of Chartres, Valence, Nancy. I alerted the senior investigating judge, deputies, ministers of justice, the Defender of Rights. All these people, the prosecutors, you, sir, are responsible for the situation." But Gabriel Fortin immediately closed himself, refusing to answer the president as well as the lawyers who multiplied the attempts to make him react. The applicant remained entrenched in his chair, silent in front of the expert psychiatrist who detected in him an "indifference to the fate of others". He is a man guided by "a vengeful and narcissistic movement," he also concluded.
The accused had no intention of explaining himself, in no way willing to submit to justice. He simply intended to pour out his resentment towards all those he considered responsible for his social and professional decline. "He doesn't even question himself, it's the others, it's not him," Estelle Luce's mother sighed lucidly to journalists. It is always the fault of others and I do not think we will have answers to a number of questions. It's a wall in front of us.
»A defendant "stubborn, proud"
Basically, Gabriel Fortin could have been part of the France of the "yellow vests", noted the lawyer of civil party Me Hervé Gerbi during his pleading. The one who occupied the roundabouts "to claim the hope of a tomorrow". At the time of carrying out his deadly project, this 48-year-old engineer is an unemployed man at the end of his rights who has not mourned his previous jobs.
But the "four million" computer documents seized at his home have highlighted the tracking, surveillance, research on the victims and their relatives and journeys made for many months. A long and meticulous preparation that has nothing to do with the malaise of the unemployed, the licensed, pointed out the lawyers of civil parties. "We do not solve our social problems with a revolver, observed anyway Me Alain Jakubowicz, representing Pôle emploi. Social escheatment does not give a license to kill.
»He sees no other option than to respond to his own failures with fury because "he does not like to be proven wrong, he is stubborn, proud," pointed out the attorney general Laurent de Caigny, before requesting life imprisonment, with a security period of 22 years. There is in the murder of Estelle Luce, Patricia Pasquion, Géraldine Caclin and the attempted assassination against Bertrand Meichel an "immense time gap between a professional conflict and a brief and extremely brutal act" and an "unspeakable gap between the reality of a conflict in employment and four blood crimes", castigated the representative of the public prosecutor.
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For his lawyers, the alteration of Gabriel Fortin's discernment at the time of the facts was not in doubt. His "paranoia crushes everything, it takes over his personality and it has completely prevented him from living. I believe that this is the sign of a great alteration, or even an abolition of his discernment, "said Me Romaric Château, interviewed by journalists. But the psychiatric experts concluded that he did not present any alteration or abolition of discernment at the time of the facts. The "HRD killer" is therefore fully responsible for his actions.