She is the Achilles heel of Rémi Chesne's defense.
The one who, two years after the death of Patrick Isoird, had ended up designating him as the brain of a macabre plan, in which she would have participated out of naivety, without knowing the finality.
"Rémi was supposed to be my friend… I believed him, I blame myself for having been so stupid", Audrey Louvet keeps repeating, an argument that serves as a line of defense and that she has been dwelling on ever since. Monday before the Assize Court of Hérault.
The duo are on trial there for having kidnapped and murdered Patrick Isoird, a 49-year-old hospital worker without history, single and father of a girl, who disappeared on June 23, 2014 in Sète.
His decomposing body, bearing two bullet holes and partially charred, was discovered three weeks later at the bottom of a disused mushroom farm in the city, the “Listel cave”.
According to him, Audrey Louvet would have simply wanted to "render service" to Rémi Chesne, a former lover who became a friend, to help him recover a debt of money.
At least that's what she explained this Friday, during an interrogation of more than six hours which did not allow to remove all the gray areas, her co-accused having, him, always denied any involvement.
A gaunt figure draped in a dark shawl, her long chestnut hair framing an angular face, this 39-year-old mother with two children unfolds her story in a whiny voice.
"I never wanted Mr. Isoird to die, I blame myself a lot", she begins standing at the bar - released last June, she appears free.
"He told me that if I spoke, he would kill me and my children"
Audrey Louvet recounts as well as in the spring of 2014, Rémi Chesne had confided to her having "money galleys", struggling to pay her rent.
“One day, he even told me that he had nothing to feed his daughter.
So I shared my package with him from the Restos du Cœur… ”, she says.
His "friend" was careful not to tell him that he is in reality a multi-owner and has 400,000 euros in the bank.
No debt in reality, if not a stubborn resentment between him and Patrick Isoird, with whom the wife of Rémi Chesne had cheated on him five years earlier ... A case which then resulted in the suicide of the person concerned.
"All that I discovered in police custody!"
», Explains Audrey Louvet who repeats that she has been manipulated and is« too stupid ».
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This is how she accepts, she says, to serve as bait.
It turns out that she also had, years earlier, a brief relationship with Patrick Isoird, who accepts a date.
Using the pretext of "visiting the tomb of (his) cats", Louvet attracts him to a remote gallery of the mushroom farm ... This is where instead of the "two professionals" who should simply "scare" Patrick Isoird Rémi Chesne emerges, masked, gloved, and armed with a rifle.
"He held us up, and then he threw a roll of tape at me and forced me to tie him up.
Then he said to me:
Get out of there and wait for me outside.
Remi Chesne would have threatened her afterwards.
"He told me that if I spoke, he would kill me, me and my children" ... Before giving him 200 euros.
"The price of your silence?
“Asks the president.
“It wasn't worth it, I was too afraid he would hurt my children.
A version which hardly convinces neither the president, nor the lawyers.
All are working to dismantle this "naivety" brandished by Audrey Louvet, a fragile young woman, raised by an abusive mother and stepfather, fallen into "chronic assistantship", according to a relative, and in constant search of silver.
"I am not a liar"
"Do this, do that, tie up ... Is there nothing stopping you?"
», Annoys the president.
“I was scared madam.
When you get pointed with a gun ... I did what Remi said.
We are astonished that she did not seek to know the amount of the debt, nor its origin.
“I didn't ask myself any questions,” she replies repeatedly.
We ask him how Rémi Chesne managed to hold a lamp, a gun, a bag in the cave at the same time.
Why Patrick Isoird remained almost silent, throughout the episode.
“I don't know…” she repeats.
We also openly doubt the reason given to attract Patrick Isoird into the cave.
“Wasn't that sexual?
», Asks Me Frank Berton, lawyer for Rémi Chesne.
“There was never any question of that!
“, Offends Audrey Louvet, who has also admitted to having already had relations in exchange for shopping at the supermarket.
"So it was to go see the grave of the little cat ..." sighs the criminal lawyer, skeptical.
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"I am not a liar", finally annoys Louvet, who cracks and yells towards the box: "But tell the truth too, you. I hate you ! I hate you ! »Rémi Chesne makes a movement of surprise. Audrey Louvet becomes entangled, does not know what to answer, even as her lawyer comes to her rescue. Manipulator, Audrey Louvet? Psychiatric experts considered him "submissive" and "dependent". Her own brother had harsher words: “She has a very low IQ. If we told her to jump off a bridge, she would. "
