MICHEL RUBINEL/AFP
Bodies found in Buttes-Chaumont: Assia B.’s husband transported her body by cart and bus (Photo taken in Buttes-Chaumont in 2022)
MISCELLANEOUS FACTS – He wanted her to be found, he claims. Twelve days after the discovery in a Paris park of the dismembered body of Assia, 46, her husband, who admitted having killed her while denying that he wanted her dead, was indicted for murder by spouse and imprisoned on Saturday February 25. After 48 hours in police custody, Youcef M. was presented to an investigating judge who indicted him for murder by spouse, said the Paris prosecutor’s office.
Facing the investigating judge and the investigators, the man gave more details on how the tragic evening unfolded. He confirmed that he had strangled his wife Assia during an argument that arose amid resentments that had existed within the couple for several years, reports The Parisian.
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According to information from the daily, Youcef M. then cut his wife’s body into several pieces in the kitchen of his apartment and then placed the human pieces in garbage bags. Not having a vehicle, he would then have placed the bags in a shopping trolley and taken the bus to go to Paris, to the Buttes-Chaumont.
“He really wanted us to come and question him”
The choice of location is no accident. The father of the family claimed to have decided on this place because “It’s one of the most beautiful parks in Paris and he really wanted Assia not to disappear (…) and that we come and question him”pleaded his lawyer.
“My client always disputed that he had wanted to kill his wife, he found himself in a whirlwind of total amazement”, said Me Beyreuther-Minkov. According to the lawyer, “It was a united couple, married for 26 years with three children who overcame many difficulties but in which there was no violence”.
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Versatile employee in a supermarket, recently on sick leave, Youcef M. “was unable to tell his children that the death of the mother was his fault”she said again.
“The whole family is in shock and in a state of amazement. They have no perspective on the situation and are still struggling to achieve “reacted to AFP Me Antoine Ory, lawyer for the family of the victim and the couple’s three children.
The qualification of assassination not retained
“Despite the post-mortem facts, today it is no longer the qualification of assassination which is retained but that of murder of a spouse”observed in front of the press his lawyer, Me Dominique Beyreuther-Minkov.
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The prosecution had opened a judicial investigation on February 17 for assassination, attack on the integrity of a corpse and concealment of a corpse. The investigating magistrate in charge of this case therefore reclassified the facts, considering, in the light of his statements, that the husband, born in 1972, had not premeditated his action. “My client, who collapsed, explained himself as humanly as he could” while in police custody, his lawyer said.
According to the latter, Youcef M. had reported to the police on February 3 the disappearance of his wife from the family apartment located in Montreuil (Seine-Saint-Denis). On social networks, he had mentioned his absence from January 31.
Inconsistent statements
On February 6, he was heard by the personal crime repression brigade (BRDP), which then launched an investigation. Then the dismembered body of a woman was discovered on February 13 and 14.
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On Monday 13, at the beginning of the afternoon, a plastic bag containing the pelvis and thighs was found by municipal parks and gardens agents, under a pile of green waste at Buttes-Chaumont, a large landscaped park from the 19th century. arrondissement of the capital (north-east).
Very popular with walkers and joggers, the hilly park which covers 25 hectares was immediately evacuated and searched by the police. The next day, other remains, including the head, were found. The victim was identified through the analysis of his fingerprints. Several media had revealed a few days after the discovery of the dismembered body that the statements of the husband, considered incoherent, had aroused the suspicions of the police.
The number of femicides increased by 20% in France in 2021 compared to the previous year, with 122 women killed by the blows of their spouse or ex-spouse, against 102 in 2020, according to figures from the Ministry of the Interior .
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