The civil party's lawyers arrived this Monday afternoon in Issancourt-et-Rumel (Ardennes) for a new week of searches to search for the body of Estelle Mouzin, alleged victim in 2003 of the serial killer Michel Fourniret.

These excavations, the seventh in the Ardennes since June 2020 - the scene of a good part of Michel Fourniret's criminal course - must last a week and be done in part in the presence of Monique Olivier, the ex-wife of the killer who died in May. .

According to the mayor of the small town, Ghislain Debaiffe, "the deforested plot" to allow these excavations "is about four hectares" and adjoins a plot already excavated.

Exploration of the woods

Around 11:00 a.m., a police van from the criminal identification gendarmerie arrived on site, then around 3:00 p.m., the lawyers for the family of Estelle Mouzin, Didier Seban and Corinne Herrmann.

An excavator was also installed in the cleared plot.

The communal wood of Issancourt-et-Rumel has already been explored, in particular in June and April by investigators and the examining magistrate Sabine Kheris, from “indications” provided by Monique Olivier.

Research has so far been unsuccessful.

Acknowledgment of the facts

On April 1, Monique Olivier had for the first time recognized a role in the sequestration of Estelle, kidnapped at the age of nine, on January 9, 2003 in Guermantes (Seine-et-Marne).

She had specified that she had accompanied Michel Fourniret to the edge of the wood of Issancourt-et-Rumel to let him go and bury the girl's body.

The village of Issancourt-et-Rumel is located some 4 km from Ville-sur-Lumes, where, still according to Monique Olivier, Michel Fourniret kidnapped, raped and killed Estelle, in a house belonging to his sister.

Estelle Mouzin's partial DNA was found in two places on a mattress seized in 2003 in this house.

Sentenced to life imprisonment for the murders of seven young women or adolescent girls between 1987 and 2001, Michel Fourniret finally admitted in March 2020 his responsibility in the disappearance of Estelle Mouzin.

He died at 79 in Paris on May 10.

Justice

Disappearance of Estelle Mouzin: New excavations planned from August 30

Miscellaneous

Estelle Mouzin case: The new series of excavations in the Ardennes is over

  • Disappearance

  • Michel Fourniret

  • Estelle Mouzin

  • Lawyer

  • Society