He had not set foot in his village of Thorigné-sur-Dué (Sarthe) since 1997, when the court sentenced him to life imprisonment for the murders of his brother, his sister-in-law and his two nieces. Twenty-five years later, Dany Leprince, totally free since 2021, was back on his land on Saturday. Still claiming to be innocent in this case, the former prisoner came to present his book “They stole my life”, released this fall in which he recounts the “judicial harassment” he says he experienced and his hope of obtaining review of his trial.
Accompanied by his lawyer, Dany Leprince also returned to see the house where he lived at the time of the tragedy, a few hundred meters from the home of his younger brother Christian. “He is very combative, very determined that justice will clear him completely”, assured Maître Olivier Morice.
A second request for review filed in 2021
On September 4, 1994, Christian Leprince, his wife and two of their daughters, aged 7 and 10, were found murdered with knives in their house in Thorigné-sur-Dué. Two days later, Dany Leprince was arrested with four other members of his family, including his wife Martine. After forty-six hours in police custody, denounced by his wife and his eldest daughter, he had confessed to the murder of his younger brother, without mentioning his sister-in-law and the two children. But he quickly recanted and has maintained his innocence ever since.
No fingerprint or genetic belonging to him was discovered at the scene of the crimes, recalls Dany Leprince, who now lives in Lot-et-Garonne. At the time, it was not possible to appeal against a conviction at the assizes and his appeal in cassation had been rejected. A first request for review led to new investigations in 2006, but this request was finally rejected in 2011.
In March 2021, he filed a second, quickly resulting in additional information. “We really hope that she can go all the way and have Dany Leprince’s innocence recognized, because in our view today there are elements which are new” and which could allow the court of revision to quash the conviction of Dany Leprince, declared Maître Morice. He hopes for a decision from the investigating committee “before the summer”, in any case by the end of the year.