A weeklong family trip to Crete.
It is the surprise that Xavier F. was preparing for the 50 years of his wife, Claire.
This stay never took place.
On December 26, 2018, this green space employee at Clermont-Ferrand town hall stabbed this 49-year-old teacher in their house in Durtol (Puy-de-Dôme).
Claire had just announced their separation to him, an outcome that seemed inexorable in this couple formed 32 years ago.
"Stunned", Xavier F. was able to "prefer to kill his wife rather than separate from her, [this] reality being unbearable to him," says an expert psychiatrist who examined this 54-year-old man, whose trial took place. opens this Thursday in front of the Puy-de-Dôme Assize Court.
A murder on a spouse reminding that the breakup or its announcement is the first trigger for the act of feminicides.
An "unbalanced" love
In this case, no trace of domestic or psychological violence.
Relations between these spouses slowly deteriorated after the burnout of Xavier, hospitalized for three months in psychiatry, in 2017. According to the eldest daughter of the couple, the father did not feel, then, supported by his wife.
It didn't change his feelings for her.
He was still "madly in love" with her, according to the eldest, even though she "hadn't been for a long time.
"
This "unbalanced" love, according to a relative of the victim, fell into horror on December 26, 2018 when the couple's other daughter, 14 at the time, discovered her father strangling her mother in the her big sister's bedroom.
The teenager begs him to stop.
In vain.
"How I could have done that, it is not possible", coward, after his crime, the father to his younger daughter who alerted the emergency services.
"I killed her," he admits, sobbing to the gendarmes.
If he recognizes his responsibility in the death of his wife, the accused, defended by the Portejoie law firm, assures that he has no memory of his actions.
"Physically, it's me, in my head it's not me," he will report.
"A partial psychogenic amnesia of the facts is possible", assesses the same psychiatrist, who notes the impulsiveness of Xavier F. when he feels despised.
Humiliation, an important concept in this file.
Stabbed in the neck
During the investigation, the youngest daughter testified that her mother could be "extremely humiliating" towards her father.
She did not hesitate to "belittle" Xavier, attested the mother of the accused.
Nevertheless, the husband was in "adoration" for this woman with a strong personality and frequent mood swings.
"A wonderful wife who still lives in my mind and my heart," he wrote from his cell to his eldest daughter, represented with her sister by the Canis law firm.
On the day of the events, the husband affirms that his wife grabbed his testicles, throwing him "you have nothing" or "you are nothing".
He "exploded in her head", but gave Claire no chance, stabbing her seven times in the neck.
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Is the state of confusion alleged by the accused credible?
"It is not compatible with the perfectly reasoned reasons for his gesture following the prospect of a separation from his wife and the humiliation suffered on the morning of the facts", decides the prosecution, for whom the homicidal intent is characterized.
With Xavier F., "his rigid thought patterns do not allow him to imagine a life after separation", notes another expert psychiatrist.
His future will be played on Friday April 9 with the verdict.
He faces life imprisonment.