The man, who was in his late sixties, presented himself openly even though he had been wanted by the police for 35 years. He lived in the Grande-Motte region before killing himself in 2021.
“You were a policeman.” It is with these three words that Nagui – then still presenter of the program “Everyone wants to take their place” – presents in 2019 a candidate named François.
With graying hair and beard, the man, who seems to be approaching sixty, then retraces his career in the police, from the cavalry regiment of the Republican Guard to motorcycle interventions within the gendarmerie. A very normal sequence in the France 2 game show.
Suicide in 2021
However, on this video found by the weekly Mariannecandidate François is in reality François Vérove, known as “the Grêlé”, a serial killer who had deceived investigators for 35 years and who had been wanted, since the 1980s and 1990s, throughout the country for several murders and rapes.
Judge Nathalie Turquey and the criminal brigade are working on at least 30 cases, including 9 homicides committed between 1983 and 1994, which might be attributed to her. Figures that would make François Vérove one of the worst French serial killers.
In September 2021, knowing he was on the verge of being unmasked by his DNA, following having lived 35 years without incident in the La Grande-Motte region (Hérault), the man killed himself in an Airbnb in Grau -du-Roi, in Gard, a few hours before a police summons. In a letter, the latter explains having killed following a “crazy rage” but not having reoffended since 1997.
Patricia Tourancheau, journalist and author of Le Grêlé: The Killer Was a Cop, pointed out in her book that the killer’s wife, who was unaware of his past, had already mentioned this television appearance. “According to his wife, his François ‘did not hide’ and even recently participated in ‘a Nagui game show with his face uncovered'”, we can read. The sequence found by Marianne is thus one of the rare filmed documents of “Grêlé.”