Disappearance of Estelle Mouzin: new research planned from Monday

Europe 1 with AFP 10:28 am, November 13, 2021

A new search campaign for the body of Estelle Mouzin, alleged victim of serial killer Michel Fourniret in 2003, is to open Monday in the Ardennes, said a lawyer and a source close to the investigation on Friday.

This research of the girl's body, the eighth in the Ardennes since June 2020, must take place like the previous ones in the presence of Monique Olivier, according to a source close to the investigation.

Research carried out in Issancourt-et-Rumel

The ex-wife of the serial killer, who died in May, should arrive on Monday, extracted from the prison where she is serving a 28-year security measure for complicity in four of the murders of "the ogre of the Ardennes", according to this same source.

Dog teams, including one from Belgium, must assist the investigators.

The operation will be carried out in Issancourt-et-Rumel, confirmed to AFP Me Corinne Hermann who defends Estelle's family.

The communal wood of this locality has already been explored twice by the investigators, on the basis of indications provided by Monique Olivier, and it is on a new section, until then not exploited, that the research must be concentrated, according to the source close to the investigation.

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The plot concerned is "a clear forest of oaks and beeches" located north of the previous areas excavated, told AFP Ghislain Debaiffe, mayor of Issancourt-et-Rumel.

Monique Olivier had for the first time recognized in April a role in the kidnapping of the child, who disappeared 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 woods to let him go and bury the body.

The village of Issancourt-et-Rumel is located 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.

The child's partial DNA was found in two places on a mattress seized in 2003 from this house.

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

He died at 79 in Paris on May 10.