‘Ogre of the Ardennes’ could be Europe’s worst serial killer

The Fourniret case has sparked calls to bring down the police and legal barriers between EU countries, says Ann Cahill.

Police believe Fourniret could be one of Europe's biggest serial killers.

POLICE in seven countries are now interested in interviewing 62 year old Michel Fourniret. So far the bespectacled well-spoken French man has admitted to nine murders but police suspect he could be one of Europe's biggest serial killers.

What they have uncovered so far is the stuff of Hollywood movies.

Three times married, father of five, never held a steady job, stole terror group's money, owner of a French chateau, and hunter of virgins, needing to trap and kill at least two a year, according to his own confession.

But at the end of June he was within hours of being released from police custody in Belgium.

In the end the conviction of Belgium's worst paedophile killer Marc Dutroux sealed his fate. Fourniret's third wife, Monique Olivier, 55, got worried when Dutroux's wife got 30 years jail for her role in his crimes that saw several girls murdered, including two who starved to death in the specially built bunker under his house in Charleroi.

The woman who spent 17 years with Fourniret gave police the vital evidence they needed and on Friday 2 July he confessed to nine murders.

She admitted her role too in helping him trap young girls, even using their baby son these expeditions, and watched behind a two way mirror as he tortured, raped and eventually killed them.

Two of them were buried in the 10 hectare grounds of the Chateau de Satou in the forests of the French Ardennes. The couple led police to the graves last week, directing operations as a helicopter flew overhead.

Prosecutor Yves Charpenel, from the French city of Reims, one of those present during the macabre search. He said Fourniret showed no guilt or remorse but appeared to be in complete control, like a chess player plotting his next move.

"There were 200 people around him and a helicopter overhead, and we felt he was in his element," he said.

The remains of two of his victims who disappeared in 1989 were found.

They were Jeanne-Marie Desramault, 22, and Elisabeth Brichet, 12.

Nobody quite knows when the carpenter began his killing spree but from 1966 to 1987 he was convicted and spent time in jail in France three times for kidnapping and raping minors and for assault.

He was sentenced to seven years in prison in 1987 but since he was in jail for four years by the time he was convicted, he was released within six months, having been a model prisoner according to the French authorities.

While in prison he met Monique Olivier who visited him regularly knowing he was a paedophile and rapist.

When he was released in 1987 they married after he divorced his second wife, Nicole, and had a son, Silim.

In 1992, they moved across the border to Belgium where Fourniret, having received a certificate of good character from the Belgian authorities, got a job as a supervisor in a primary school.

In 1996, he first came to the attention of the Belgian policy over a bizarre incident of stolen guns and the sale of one to a circus performer called Tarzan in Jette in 1994. One of the guns had been used in the failed abduction of a nurse in the same year.

When Belgian police seized the second gun during the row when Fourniret was trying to sell it to Tarzan, they alerted the French police who interviewed the two, but did not appear to know of Fourniret's record.

The evidence of a 13-year-old Congolese girl he tried to kidnap in Belgium last year led to his arrest. She had managed to escape from the back of his van and gave the police a good description.

But without further evidence, after being held for a year during the investigation, he was due for release at the end of June.

At last with the revelations of his wife, police across Europe have started reopening their files of missing girls and reported rapes and looking for links with Fourniret.

Fourniret claimed he was not active from 1990 to 2000, but the authorities do not believe this.

His wife has given evidence of his murdering their au-pair in 1993. Investigators believe he could have killed at least 30 people. In France they have reopened 30 cases they believe he could have been responsible for. In Belgium the number is 12, there are two in Holland, one each in Austria, Germany, Britain and Denmark.

The case of the Ogre of the Ardennes is leading to new calls for greater cooperation between Europe's police forces. While the borders have come down between EU countries making it easier for people to travel, the borders between police and legal jurisdiction have remained very much in place.

There are fresh calls for an EU wide database of sex offenders that would be available to the police authorities in all 25 member states. However several countries are not in favour because of issues of sovereignty they say. Justice ministers are expected to discuss the issue when they meet in Brussels next Monday.

Time-line of a killer

December 1980: Michel Fourniret admits to murdering a motorist in a rest area off the A6 in Burgundy to steal his wallet.

1987: Killed the partner of cell-mate Jean-Pierre Hellegouache, the treasurer of French terror group Direct Action for financial reasons.

December 1987: Isabelle Laville, 17, disappears in Auxerre where Fourniret's wife Monique is from.

August 1988: Fabienne Leroy disappears from the Marne region. Fourniret admits killing her, copying the methods used by another killer operating in the area.

March 1989: Jeanne Marie Desramault, 22, disappears. Fourniret admits killing her.

December 1989: Elisabeth Brichet, 12, missing in Belgium. He admits killing her.

November 1990: Natacha Danais, 13 years, kidnapped from the Loire-Atlantique region. Found stabbed to death three days later. Fourniret admits to killing her.

1993: Au-pair, denied killing her though his wife says he did.

May 2000: Celine Saison, 18, disappears in Belgium. Fourniret says he cannot remember her.

May 2001: Mananya Thumpong, 13, disappears in Belgium. He does not deny killing her but cannot remember her.

June 2003: A 13-year-old he abducted escapes from his van and gives police a good description of her kidnapper, leading to the arrest of Fourniret.