It's a sunny and sweet day like the Côte d'Azur in reserve in spring. This April 12, 2017, Evelyne Rencurel returns home from her morning stroll, her wand and her Nice-Morning under her arm. In leafing through the newspaper, she stops at an article in the news section: it talks about a man, Olivier C., suspected of having wanted to poison an old lady whose apartment he had acquired for life, a few streets away, at Le Cannet (Alpes-Maritimes)…
"I jumped when I saw this name," says Evelyne Rencurel. My first reflex was to call Marie-Martine, my sister. ” Olivier C.? The two women do not doubt it: it is Olivier Cappelaere, a business manager who has become the confidant, and finally the universal legatee of their great-aunt, who died suddenly two and a half years earlier…
Incredulous, the Rencurel sisters carry out their little investigation and confirm their intuition. In the directory, Evelyne found the phone number of Gabriel Marino-Affaitati, mentioned in the article as being close to the retired life annuity worker and collateral victim of poisoning. At the end of the line, he then tells him the story of a nightmare day, dating back to April 7, 2015.
Almost unconscious and seizures after drinking a glass of water
That day, the 50-year-old received a panicked call from Suzanne Bailly, a prominent 85-year-old retired woman to whom he occasionally rendered small services. "Gaby! Come quickly, it starts all over again! ”She lets go before hanging up. Gabriel Marino-Affaitati jumps in his car, towards Sérénité, the residence of Suzanne Bailly.
On the spot, the man finds her on the ground, almost unconscious and seized with convulsions. "I saw animals running on the curtains," she said afterwards. In his delirium, the retiree, however, has the reflex to ask Gaby to taste the water, "bitter taste" ... The man drinks a swig, but finds nothing to complain about.
At the Cannes hospital where she is transported, the doctors are pessimistic. It is already the third time in two months that Suzanne Bailly has been plunged into a coma ... "Possible stroke", think the caregivers. But three hours later, Gabriel Marino-Affaitati is in turn admitted to the emergency room for the same symptoms ... Alerted, the police analyzed the water bottle of Suzanne Bailly: it is stuffed with atropine, a cardiac accelerator which , consumed in high doses, turns into poison.
The pieces of the puzzle will soon be assembled, thanks to the neighbors of Suzanne Bailly. To the police, they tell that Olivier Cappelaere, to whom the retiree sold his apartment for life, had multiplied his visits recently. One of them also reports an incident going back to the morning of April 7: hearing noise at Suzanne's, she had inquired about her condition, receiving only a strange grunt coming from the bathroom…
Olivier Cappelaere had introduced himself to the old lady that morning
The DNA and telephone analyzes will attest that Olivier Cappelaere, who had a set of keys, broke into his tenant's house that morning. At his home, the police will also get their hands on atropine in the form of eye drops intended for his dog, Calvin.
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Judged last year at the assizes in Nice, Olivier Cappelaere denied everything as a whole. “With Suzanne Bailly, we were on good terms. Now she's rewriting history, but I don't hold it against her, ”he even dared. Present in the public, the Rencurel sisters remember an accused "arrogant", "practically giving a course on life annuities", but much less talkative about his financial difficulties, an obvious motive for these repeated poisonings.
In the meantime, the Rencurel sisters have filed complaints. Exhumed, the body of their great-aunt, Jacqueline Imbert, also revealed astronomical amounts of atropine ... and led to the indictment of Olivier Cappelaere for poisoning with premeditation, facts liable to life. "We were on the verge of the perfect crime!" Sums up Ariane Kabsch, their lawyer.
Pending his trial, probably next year, the man is being tried again this week in the Bailly case: sentenced in 2019 to twenty years in prison, he had appealed.
"We also expect him to deny it all the way for Jacqueline ...", cowardly, devoid of illusions, Marie-Martine Rencurel. At 74, it is her tight throat that she evokes Jacqueline Imbert, this great-aunt "distant by blood, but very close emotionally since our childhood".
With Emile, the love of her life, Jacqueline welcomes each summer the two little Parisian girls who spend their three months vacation on the French Riviera. The couple, who had no children, consider the girls as their own. “They set up a shock repair business. Jacqueline put me on the luggage rack of her Solex when she left for delivery, ”recalls Marie-Martine. An unwavering bond that will lead the two sisters to settle in the South, retired, to get closer to Jacqueline and "Snowy".
He manages the old lady's accounts, he chooses his doctors
When he died in 2009, they saw Olivier Cappelaere getting closer to Jacqueline, captivated by this delicious man, his former neighbor, with whom the annoyances of co-ownership meetings are now forgotten. "He was very attentive, he took her to the restaurant, brought him seafood ... He called her godmother at heart, " says Marie-Martine, bitter.
Over the years, Olivier Cappelaere became more and more present, managing the old lady's accounts, choosing his doctors. "She was in an emotional grip, but it was impossible to criticize him," recalls Evelyne. Olivier was the word of the gospel. ”
It must be said that the man presents well. Director of a meat sales company located at the MIN of Nice, the Cannois, always well dressed, luxury watch on the wrist, circulates in a sedan. With his wife, an accountant, he heads a small real estate empire: a house and seven apartments, five of which are life annuities and one in Isola 2000, an upscale ski resort.
Olivier Cappelaere's business collapses
Behind the facade, however, the troubles accumulate. Angry with his associates, who will speak of a "cossard, preferring to have a good time rather than rolling up his sleeves", summarizes Maître Jean-Charles Darey, Suzanne Bailly's lawyer, Olivier Cappelaere is taken by the throat. His business collapsed, he finally shut down, at the end of 2014.
The Rencurel sisters still ignore him, but their aunt, who covers him with gifts, has meanwhile changed his will and appointed Olivier Cappelaere as universal legatee. On November 1, 2014, All Saints Day, the old lady spent her last day with Marie-Martine and her son. “We went to flower Milou's grave, then to the restaurant. After that, we gave her a drive, she was fine. Oh, my Cannes is beautiful… I can still see her saying that, poor little mother, ”chokes Marie-Martine, in tears.
The next day, Olivier Cappelaere warns the two sisters that Jacqueline is in a coma. "Above all, no relentless therapy!" He says to the caregivers in front of Marie-Martine, outraged. Two days later, Jacqueline Imbert dies. "It was believed that her beautiful death", regrets Evelyne.
At the funeral, "not a tear" on the face of Olivier Cappelaere, who inherits a comfortable heritage estimated at nearly 700,000 euros: two garages, an apartment, the vacation home of the couple Imbert nicknamed the Mazet, from the 'gold, life insurance ... "He had promised never to sell Snowy's 4x4, which he hastened to do", explains Evelyne, among a multitude of affronts in memory of Jacqueline.
"It is only out of love for her that we act today", moreover specify the two sisters, who would not inherit if convicted, due to the existence of other rights holders. "When I think she was probably at the cemetery when he organized this poisoning ... sighs Evelyne. This monstrous gesture haunts me every night. ”
LANDMARKS
2008: the Cappelaere spouses begin to invest in life annuity apartments on the Côte d'Azur. According to this contract, the owner pays a monthly pension to the occupant, generally an elderly person. On the death of the latter, he becomes owner of right.
2009: Jeannine H. sells his apartment in Le Cannet (Alpes-Maritimes) to life for the couple. She died seven months later.
November 4, 2014: Jacqueline Imbert, 92, dies suddenly. His grand-nieces discover that Olivier Cappelaere, his confidant, has been appointed universal legatee. He inherits nearly 700,000 euros.
December 2014: in financial difficulty for several years, Olivier Cappelaere's company files for bankruptcy.
April 7, 2015: Suzanne Bailly, who sold her apartment for life to Olivier Cappelaere, is taken by a strange uneasiness and borders on death. His neighbor Gabriel Marino-Affaitaiti, who drank from the same glass of water, was also hospitalized.
April 20, 2015: during a search, atropine was discovered at the home of Olivier Cappelaere, the same poison that was found in a bottle of water from Suzanne Bailly. He is incarcerated and indicted for premeditated poisoning.
2017: Jacqueline Imbert's grand-nieces discover, in Nice-Matin, the Bailly affair. The body of their great aunt is exhumed: it contains atropine. Olivier Cappelaere is indicted.
March 6, 2019: The man is sentenced to twenty years in prison in the Bailly case.
February 25, 2020: appeal trial.
Jeannine H., a classified file
A funny coincidence. By peeling the heritage of the Cappelaere, the investigators discovered that the couple had acquired over the years no less than five apartments for life, always to isolated old ladies, having little or no family. Jeannine H. was one of them. The 83-year-old retiree had sold her apartment in Le Cannet (Alpes-Maritimes) to Olivier Cappelaere in March 2009, before dying suddenly, barely seven months later…
At the time, given his age, the doctors had done very little research and concluded in a natural death following a myocardial infarction. In 2015, thanks to revelations about Olivier Cappelaere, the prosecution had opened an investigation and requested the exhumation of Jeannine H. But his only descendant, a distant nephew, having opposed it, it never took place … The case was closed without follow-up.
