The accused of the murder of Corporal Arthur Noyer was calm and polite on the first day of his assize trial, Monday, describing himself as a "vagrant" at the time of the facts.

At the helm, his mother described a helpful son, just a little withdrawn. 

This is the first time that Nordahl Lelandais has appeared before an assize court.

Returned to justice for the kidnapping and murder of little Maëlys, in 2017 in Pont-de-Beauvoisin, the former soldier is tried in another case, since Monday morning: that of the murder of Corporal Arthur Noyer, that he had met in a nightclub in Chambéry, the same year.

Facts recognized by the accused, who, however, continues to deny having wanted to kill the young man of 23 years. 

"Nervous? Yes, when I drive"

“I never wanted to kill,” insists Nordahl Lelandais, under the watchful eyes of Arthur Noyer's parents, in search of explanations. The president however warned them at the opening of the hearing: the assizes can be violent and they may not have the answers they expect.

On the form, the accused returns for the moment an image poles apart from the violence and the relentlessness he showed towards the corporal.

"Your ex-partner describes you as someone nervous who likes to please, does that suit you?" Asks the president in the context of the personality test.

"Nervous, yes, when I drive. And then, it's true that I like to get ready".

As at the hearing, with a well-ironed sky-blue shirt, hair cropped short. 

>> HONDELATTE TELLS

- Nordahl Lelandais, my client

Nordahl Lelandais remains calm and polite, even when the magistrate lingers on the litany of his academic and professional failures, the abandonment of his BTS sport, his contract in the army cut short, his aborted dog breeding business and the repeated sick leave.

The family lawyer tries to destabilize him, by reminding him that some qualify him as a "slacker".

But the accused does not go out of his way, smiles and nuances: "I am not a big fan of work."

A Tanguy who still lived with his parents until the year of the murders, at the age of 34.

“I didn't know where I was going,” he says.

"My friends were building their lives and I was a wanderer."

"He went out to Chambéry, went to see his friends"

In the afternoon, it is the mother of Nordahl Lelandais, retired 72 years old, who comes to confirm the smooth presentation, even flattering of her son. She describes a gentle, kind child, then a "good" man, a good, helpful son. Admittedly, she concedes that he was a little withdrawn and spoke little in the family home. "But I left him alone. He went out to Chambéry, went to see his friends, he had his life. I didn't bother him."

What is striking is the way in which she almost completely ignores the facts, evacuated in a few words.

“What happened, I didn't see it coming,” she said.

Like an ellipse in her words, she goes directly to the story of her son's stay in a psychiatric hospital where, stupefied by drugs - after his arrest - she had the impression of seeing a zombie.

"But for some time now, I found my son. He is fine today, Nordahl."

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Words that echo strangely in the courtroom, right in front of Arthur Noyer's family and the portrait of the victim. What the lawyer of the civil parties points out to him: "Do you know, Madam, that the Noyer couple will never find their son?" Silence from Christiane Lelandais. “Can you now ask your son to tell the truth?” Asks the lawyer. The mom does. And Nordahl Lelandais to repeat what he said from the beginning: "Yes, I did kill Arthur Noyer, but it was unintentional."