They will only resume in several months. The excavations started in the Yonne at the end of May in the “cemetery” of the serial killer of the 1970s Émile Louis “Are suspended,” the prosecution told AFP on Tuesday. The decision was made after The accidental death of a gendarme on the excavations site.
“Due to the fatal accident on Friday, we will not be able to benefit immediately from all the technicians essential to the conduct of criminal excavations,” said Auxerre prosecutor Hugues de Phily. The excavations “could resume in the fall,” he added. Research should initially continue until Friday.
A 41 -year -old gendarme died on Friday after being hit by a site machine on the excavations site, in Rouvray, near Auxerre. Warrant Officer was one of the 448 gendarmes mobilized since May 26 to rattle the “cemetery” of Émile Louis in order to find, about 50 years after their disappearance, possible traces of the victims of the serial killer.
Shoes and a bike found
Only two shoes and a bicycle“Probably a woman and an old bill,” were found during this operation, the cost of which amounts to 100,000 euros, recently said Hugues de Phily. The prosecutor said, however, to remain “very prudent” as to the interest of these objects for the investigation.
The searches searched are those where Émile Louis had indicated in the 2000s having buried his victims, all young women with disabilities, pupils of public assistance. Only two of his seven identified victims were found in this “cemetery”, as well as a skull of an eighth potential victim, discovered at the end of 2018.
Previous excavations had already been carried out in the sector last fall. Only “a heel shoe sole, two textiles and a garment” had been found. However, these discoveries had been deemed promising By the civil parties, which had therefore asked for a new excavation campaign despite its high cost.
The fear of the weather
Émile Louis was sentenced in 2004 to life imprisonment perpetuity for the rapes and assassinations of seven young women who have disappeared in Yonne between 1975 and 1979. The former bus driver, who transported his victims of their host family to their medico-pedagogical institute, died in 2013 at 79 years old.
“We understand that there is a postponement during mourning. What I fear in a postponement in the fall is that it rains, “said AFP Didier Seban, the lawyer for the Yonne Disabled Defense Association, who brings together families of victims. “I would have preferred that it was a postponement of a few days,” added the council.
“We cannot still leave families while waiting,” said Pierre Monnoir, president of the association for the defense of the disabled in Yonne and whistleblower in this file. “Fall, the risk is rain, short days,” he added.
