NOTE: Graphic content warning
The Ardennes Forest is in a remote corner of western Europe and straddles the frontiers of France, Belgium, Luxembourg and Germany.
It is best known as the “impassable” area where the Nazis rolled into — and over — a sleepy France in 1940. It was also the scene of the Nazis last gasp in December 1944 during the Battle of the Bulge.
More recently, it was the home of the serial killer known as the Ogre of the Ardennes. By the time the sadistic killer finished his vile activities 11 women and girls plus one man were dead.
https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/torontosun/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/ogre5-e1657917932829.png?quality="90&strip=all&w=576 2x" height="690" loading="lazy" src="https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/torontosun/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/ogre5-e1657917932829.png?quality=90&strip=all&w=288" width="1072"/>
Investigator’s believe the killer’s victim total could be as high as 30.
On the surface, Michel Fourniret would be no one’s idea of a monster. He was owlish with his glasses, loved chess and a good book and lived in a massive chateau (purchased with ill-gotten gains).
But Fourniret had another side.
With his wife Monique Pierrette Olivier as bait, Fourniret scoured the Ardennes looking for virgins to rape, torture and kill. Cops would later say Olivier was “very much under his spell.”
The pair had met through a prison pen pal organization while Fourniret was serving time for sexually assaulting a young girl. He had promised to ice Olivier’s abusive husband and when he emerged from prison, she was waiting.
https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/torontosun/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/ogre3-e1657918072140.png?quality="90&strip=all&w=576 2x" height="752" loading="lazy" src="https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/torontosun/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/ogre3-e1657918072140.png?quality=90&strip=all&w=288" width="901"/>
Their first kill came on Dec. 11, 1987 — two months after his release — and it established the template. They had been keeping an eye on 17-year-old Isabelle Laville who they spotted walking home from school.
Olivier asked the unsuspecting teen for help, directions please, and Laville agreed. Further along the road, they spotted Fourniret pretending his car had broken down. The couple choked and sedated the girl and brought her to their home in Saint-Cyr-les-Colons, where she was raped and strangled.
Laville’s body was dumped down a well and not recovered until 2006. Fourniret was just getting started.
The pair killed again three months later after helping the wife of a fellow jailbird recover a fortune in gold ingots. His share was about $125,000 but it wasn’t enough and the pair murdered the con’s wife.
And they killed, with an added touch being Olivier inspecting their victim’s hymans to ensure they were virgins.
Soon, French newspapers were filled with terrifying articles about the Ogre of the Ardennes, who seemed to kill at will.
Fourniret later told shocked detectives that he needed to go hunting for a virgin at least twice a year. The large grounds of his chateau would become the resting place for at least two of his victims.
https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/torontosun/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/ogre4-e1657918134145.png?quality="90&strip=all&w=576 2x" height="769" loading="lazy" src="https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/torontosun/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/ogre4-e1657918134145.png?quality=90&strip=all&w=288" width="920"/>
His youngest victim was a nine-year-old girl who he raped and killed months before he was caught in Belgium trying to kidnap a 13-year-old.
The sinister duo’s final murder was the killing of nine-year-old Estelle Mouzin, who was snatched on her way home from school on Jan. 3, 2003 outside Paris. Her body has never been found and it wasn’t until 2019 that Fourniret admitted that he was killer.
But even for the most skillful killer, the clock eventually runs down. Mistakes happen. Victims get lucky.
On June 26, 2003, Fourniret botched a kidnapping attempt on a 13-year-old who called police. Husband and wife were quizzed extensively but both kept it zipped.
Then, fearing a long prison sentence, Olivier broke and told cops everything. Fourniret copped to eight murders.
https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/torontosun/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/ogre2-e1657918183333.png?quality="90&strip=all&w=576 2x" height="530" loading="lazy" src="https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/torontosun/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/ogre2-e1657918183333.png?quality=90&strip=all&w=288" width="791"/>
Fourniret and Olivier were tried in France in 2008. The Ogre of the Ardennes was sentenced to life in prison for each of the bodies that had been found while his complicit wife was handed a life sentence without the possibility of parole.
As Fourniret’s health began fading, he confessed to more murders, including the slaying of a 20-year-old British woman named Joanna Parish, along with two more murders. Detectives suspect there is more.
“We want the DNA of all victims and disappeared girls that we represent to be compared with those found on the mattress, and with all evidence under seal seized at Michel Fourniret’s home,” said lawyer Corinne Herrmann, who is representing presumed victims.
She added: “It is inconceivable that Fourniret did not kill other victims.”
On Nov. 20, 2020, Fourniret collapsed in his prison cell just two weeks before cops were to start digging for the remains of little Estelle Mouzin at a remote spot where he said he had buried the child.
On May 10, 2021, the Ogre of the Ardennes finally died, making his way to hell. He was 79 years old.
His wife Monique Pierrette Olivier is now 72 years old. She will never see the light of day.
Post a Comment