The accused of the trial which opens in Toulouse, Jean-Baptiste Ranbla, child, in June 1974 during the reconstruction of the kidnapping of his sister Marie-Dolorès.

-

Max Colin - Sipa

  • Cintia Lunimbu was 21 years old and had a smooth life.

    She was brutally killed in the heart of the summer of 2017 in her apartment in downtown Toulouse.

  • The trial of his alleged murderer opens this Monday before the Assize Court of Haute-Garonne.

  • In the box, Jean-Baptiste Rambla, already convicted of the murder of a woman.

    He is also the 7-year-old child who, in 1974 in Marseille, helplessly witnessed the fatal kidnapping of his little sister in the highly publicized Ranucci affair.

Cintia Lunimbu, 21, led the quiet life of a young girl.

She died on July 21, 2017 in her studio in the Place des Tiercerettes in Toulouse when, while she was returning from a morning's work, a complete stranger knocked on her door.

When six days later her father, worried about not having news of his only daughter, warned the firefighters, they discovered a horrific scene: Cintia was lying naked face down, slaughtered, almost beheaded.

Thanks to the DNA found under the nails of the young cleaning lady, the investigators arrested on August 9, in the Var, a certain Jean-Baptiste Rambla.

For justice, this 49-year-old man, living in the Pink City but taking refuge with his sister, was anything but a stranger.

He has been on parole for eighteen months, after being sentenced to eighteen years in prison for the murder of Corinne Beidl.

At the material time, in 2004, she was the wife of her boss.

Jean-Baptiste Rambla had an affair with her and strangled her during an argument before burying her body in a bag and hiding it in a garden shed where it was not found until seven months later.

"All my life, I had to justify myself"

But Jean-Baptiste Rambla is also for public opinion this 7-year-old child whose face appeared on all the televisions of France in July 1974. He is the little brother of Marie-Dolorès, kidnapped then killed at the foot of his building in Marseille.

He was with her when a man asked them to search for his dog.

In this sordid news item popularized by the book

The Red

Pullover, Christian Ranucci was sentenced to death, becoming in 1979 the last man executed in France and for many the banner of the need to abolish the penalty.

Jean-Baptiste Rambla grew up in a devastated home.

He is at the same time the little brother who could not protect his sister, "but also the child instrumentalized during years by his father who led his crusade" against Christian Ranucci, says his lawyer today, Frédéric. David.

The Rambla family, with Jean-Baptiste as a child and his sister Marie-Dolorès before she was killed.

- Max Colin - Sipa

“All my life I have had to justify myself,” the accused told a psychologist before his parole.

So, did this traumatized child victim have a role in the construction of today's murderer?

Will the Ranucci affair hover over the trial which opens this Monday before the assizes of Haute-Garonne?

"There is a plug on the ocean, this affair prevented him from taking his life path, explains Frédéric David, he suffers from resentment in the pathological sense of the term".

“But this man has brothers and sisters, parents who lived through the same tragedy and who I know did not become murderers, thunders Simon Cohen, the lawyer for the Lunimbu family.

Christian Ranucci has already been executed, then he served as an alibi in a first murder, are we going to kill him three times?

"

Injured man or organized murderer?

Jean-Baptiste Rambla, described as affable but timid, explained the murder of Cintia by a kind of paranoia crisis.

He had been attacked the same morning by a couple, threatened a few days before in front of the probation service.

His lawyers, Frédéric David and Aurélie Joly, believe that these circumstances may have "exacerbated his feeling of victimhood."

That when he attacks Cintia, whom he has likened to his window as one of his attackers in the morning, "he attacks all those who have hurt him".

Simon Cohen does not believe it.

"I think in reality, he did not come out at random and he did not kill accidentally," he explains.

I am convinced that when he left home he intended to attack someone and preferably a woman (...) This is why he armed himself with a cutter beforehand, which is a weapon, deadly, horrible, but also of protective equipment, overshoes, everything he needed to erase his tracks.

He gave death consciously, conscientiously, and then he erased his tracks.

"

Jean-Baptiste Rambla has "no illusions about the pain" that awaits him.

And it is alone that he will face this new trial.

The first time, his relatives supported him, his son frequently visited him in prison.

But they moved away.

They did not have the courage to believe the curse twice.

Justice

Marseille: Who is Christian Ranucci, whose shadow hangs over one of the most anticipated trials of the year?

Toulouse

Murder of a young girl in Toulouse: The suspect confessed

  • Justice