French mother faces life in prison for strangling her two newborn babies and keeping bodies in freezer
A mother was today facing life in prison after admitting strangling two newborn babies and then keeping their tiny corpses in her kitchen freezer. In one of the most horrific infanticide cases ever to come before a French court, 41-year-old Veronique Courjault claims she was ‘overwhelmed’ at the prospect of having a third and fourth child.
She pleads diminished responsibility, even saying that she killed a fifth child in the late 1990s, disposing of his body in the family fireplace.
Prosecutors in turn said she was guilty of murder and have demanded a life sentence.
Courjault appeared alone in front of a court in Tours, central France, after spending the last two-and-a-half years on remand in a prison in nearby Orleans.
She claimed 'I am no danger to society', with psychologists saying she was 'now speaking freely about what she did, making it clear that she wanted to change.'
The crimes took place in 2006 when Corjault was living with her engineer husband Jean-Louis Courjault in Seoul, South Korea, and their two sons, now aged 12 and 14.
Courjault is said to have kept her pregnancies a secret from her husband, and he was cleared of any involvement in a trial earlier this year.
While she was away on a solo trip to France he was stocking the freezer with fish when he came across the perfectly preserved corpses.
Horrified, he alerted the police and was later allowed to fly to France to be with his wife.
She initially denied having anything to do with the discovery, and both Courjaults appeared before a packed press conference saying they had no idea how the children got there.
But weeks later DNA tests proved they were the parents and they were arrested.
Courjault confessed to police to hiding two pregnancies from her husband in 2002 and 2003, giving birth alone in the bathroom before strangling the babies and putting the bodies in the freezer.
Mr Courjault was often away on business, making the deceit relatively easy.
She also confessed to the killing of the other newborn when the couple still lived in France in 1999.
A police official said Veronique Courjault made the confessions to a female investigator in October 2006.
The official, in the city of Tours, 145 miles (240 kilometers) southwest of Paris, was speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case.
Veronique Courjault described realising she was pregnant late in her term and hiding it from her husband because they had not wanted more children for financial reasons, the official said.
She sought no medical attention during the pregnancy.
Jean-Louis Courjault was present at the start of the trial.
'I love my wife and have come to support her,' he told reporters as he entered the courtroom.
He later said: 'Society has to admit that not all pregnancies are happy. My wife certainly has psychological problems.'
Veronique Courjault, who has been incarcerated since October 2006, has told psychologists she felt connected with her first two pregnancies and spoke to the fetuses.
That was not the case with her third, fourth and fifth pregnancies, she has said, adding she did not feel those fetuses move inside her.
She said: 'For me they were never children - it was a part of me, a prolongation of myself that I killed.'
Courjault's two sons have frequently visited her in prison, where she works in the library and has regular therapy with a trained psychologist.
Her first two children are now aged 12 and 14.
More than a dozen experts and 23 witnesses are expected to testify in the trial. A verdict is expected on June 17.
By @Corentin
Comment
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Comment by Sixx Shakur on June 11, 2009 at 10:51pm -
somebody ned to strangle her ass and put her in the freezer,sick as b****,and her husband is sick too to support her.
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Comment by Trisno on June 11, 2009 at 7:34pm -
WTF!!!!
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Comment by VerryRichmon on June 11, 2009 at 1:28pm
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so sad!
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Comment by Kara on June 11, 2009 at 1:14am -
people do SO much just to try to have ONE child and she had FIVE...and killed THREE!!!! WTF!!!???? CRAZY!! I just want to cry!? That is NOTHING but the Devil!!!!
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Comment by G-kid on June 11, 2009 at 12:57am -
damn that sad!!!
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Comment by QnsFinest on June 10, 2009 at 10:40pm -
Crazy b****** yo!!!!
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Comment by EFRAIN on June 10, 2009 at 8:56pm
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THEY NEED TO PUT HER UNDER THE JAIL
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Comment by Chase MILLIONZ on June 10, 2009 at 8:49pm -
********* ATTENTION THOSE SEEKIN THAT PYRO**********
CHECK OUT BRAND FREESTYLES NEW SONGS SEXY PICS
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Comment by Chase MILLIONZ on June 10, 2009 at 8:49pm
-
********* ATTENTION THOSE SEEKIN THAT PYRO**********
CHECK OUT BRAND FREESTYLES NEW SONGS SEXY PICS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0ShQqTfY7k
EVERY VEIW IS VALUED
I HAVE WHAT YOU NEED
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Comment by pimpinhos on June 10, 2009 at 7:59pm -
wtf is wrong with people these days, people need to change physically and mentally
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