The Assize Court of Aisne on Friday sentenced Jonathan Maréchal to life imprisonment for the murder of little Tom, nine years old, and the sexual assault on his corpse, in 2018 in a Picardy village. – STEVENS FREDERIC / SIPA
After more than six hours of deliberation, the verdict is in. The Aisne Assize Court on Friday sentenced Jonathan Maréchal to life imprisonment for the murder of Tom, nine years old, and the sexual assault on his corpse, in 2018 in a Picardy village. The court almost followed the requisitions of the Advocate General, without however pronouncing the 22-year security sentence he had requested.
At the verdict, the accused had no reaction, while several people burst into tears on the benches of the civil parties. “This judicial truth (…) was eagerly awaited and was very well received. It is a happy court decision ”, greeted Me Paul Henri Delarue, lawyer of the civil parties.
Body naked and covered in gasoline
On May 28, 2018, Tom’s body, almost naked and wearing only socks, a T-shirt raised at the neck, was discovered by gendarmes at the bottom of the garden of an abandoned house in Hérie-la-Vieville , village of 230 inhabitants, 30 km from Saint-Quentin.
The body, covered in gasoline, was concealed under nettles covered with a pallet. The autopsy had revealed that the death was “due to a head trauma” and traces of rape.
“I neither raped nor killed Tom”
“I understand the pain of the family. I neither raped nor killed Tom, ”said Jonathan Maréchal before the court withdrew. Neighbor of the child and now 30 years old, this man with a clean criminal record, schizoid according to psychiatric experts, has denied the accusations since the start of the trial on Monday.
Advocate General Guillaume Donnadieu, on the contrary, found him “guilty”, defending during the requisitions “the thesis of a sudden sexual drive caused by the presence of the child”. He stressed that his “genetic fingerprint”, like that of Tom, had been found on a gasoline can in the garden, and that the accused had admitted to having been “the last to have seen the child”.
“Personality disorders but not mental illness”
“The death of the child does not cause him any sadness,” said Guillaume Donnadieu. “The issue of irresponsibility must be ruled out. He has personality disorders but no mental illnesses ”.
In police custody, the accused had delivered to investigators “what he declares to be memories, in the form of flashes that appeared in his sleep, relating to the murder of little Tom”. Returning since to these words, he then evoked “the presence of blood on his clothes” and the sight of “a body stretched out, its head bloody”. A scene “perfectly compatible with the crime scene”, while “we know that the child was hit with a concrete block”, according to the magistrate.
“He can’t tell this truth. He is blocking “
“I tried to urge him to tell the truth. In vain. He is introverted, hermetic. He cannot tell this truth. He is blocking, ”for his part pleaded for the defense Me Cyril Bouchaillou. On the aspect of attacking the integrity of the corpse, he had asked for an acquittal, for the benefit of the doubt.
“In this case, we can do all possible phantasmagoria. The evidence does not support post mortem rape. It is to speculate, to add something to a terrible crime, ”he said. After the verdict was announced, the lawyer said he did not plan to appeal at this point.