Serial killer's widow guilty for part in British student's murder 33 years ago
A dead serial killer's widow faces a second life prison sentence for ‘aiding and abetting’ him in the murder of a British student in France 33 years ago.
Joanna Parrish was just 20 when she was raped and killed in Moneteau, France in May 1990 by Michel Fourniret - known as the Ogre of the Ardennes - who confessed to her murder three years before his death aged 79 in prison in 2021. His widow Monique Olivier was today found guilty of helping in the kidnapping and murder Marie-Angele Domece in 1988 and Joanna in 1990.
A third charge is for complicity in the 2003 disappearance of nine-year-old Estelle Mouzin, whose body has never been found. Olivier, 75, showed no emotion as a court in the Paris suburb of Nanterre handed down their verdict on Tuesday evening, following 10 hours of deliberation. It concluded that she has been the ‘perfect accomplice’ to Fourniret.
Speaking in a press conference after the verdict, Joanna's dad Roger Parrish said: "We are satisfied that the court recognised Monique Olivier's part in the murder of our daughter and sister." He continued: "There has never been any doubt in our minds at all that she was equally responsible for the murder of Joanna and the other completely innocent victims. From the very first moment a victim was identified she knew exactly what would happen to them and not only did she do nothing to help them, she actively encouraged and participated in both capture and murder.
"Her presence alone would have gained the confidence of all the victims who would never have believed that a woman could have been a part of such an appalling and depraved act and her participation in these acts has now been approved without any doubt. Finally we now hope after this last obstacle in the struggle for justice for Joanna has been overcome, we can remember our daughter and sister with a smile on our faces which is how of course all her many friends remember her."
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Joanna Parrish died in 1990 (Daily Mirror)Earlier on Tuesday, Olivier, speaking in a calm, conversational tone told the Hauts-de-Seine Assizes Court: "I ask for forgiveness, while knowing that everything I did is unforgivable." Such words were directed at victims’ families, including Joanna's parents, Mr Parrish and Pauline Murrell.
Joanna was working as an English teaching assistant at the Jacques-Aymot high school in Auxerre, Burgundy, as part of her French degree course at Leeds University, when she died. A post mortem revealed she had been raped and beaten, before her naked body was dumped in the River Yonne.
Fourniret was jailed in 2008 for the murders of seven girls but it took years before he finally confessed that Joanna was another of his victims. Le Parisien newspaper said Fourniret had been suffering from a heart condition and Alzheimer's, he was transferred to hospital and died in 2021 before he faced the courts. Olivier has admitted luring young girls to their home for her husband, and she has reportedly admitted to helping dispose of their bodies but denied murder.
Monique Olivier was on trial (AFP via Getty Images)Joanna's parents stormed out of a court in Paris earlier this month during the trial as the grim details of their daughter's cruel murder were laid out in front of a jury. Oliver spoke of horrors previously unreported, which turned out to be so distressing that Mr Parrish, 80, and his ex-wife Mrs Murrell, 75, couldn't bear to listen.
They made it through two traumatic hours of the Ogress's horror story before they rushed out of the court in tears. Patrick Proctor, who was Joanna's boyfriend at the time of the killing in 1993, and her 77-year-old aunt Pauline Harris also raced out of the room on hearing the grim story.
Olivier admitted how she acted like "bait" to lure the 20-year-old into the back of a van. She said her husband thought of the abductions like "a game of chess". She reportedly ignored Joanna's piercing screams as she tried to avoid Fourniret's fists as they rained down on her.
Serial killer Michel Fourniret died in 2021 (AFP/Getty Images)Her testimony included details that pushed the family over the edge. Olivier recalled how the monster - who was obsessed with defiling virgins - interrogated the young woman about her sex life. "He asked her if she had a boyfriend," she told the Parisian court. "It must have annoyed him when she said she had, because (to him) it meant she was not a virgin. In sexuality he always wanted to be the first. That's why he was violent and did what he did."
The family avoided the late morning session, in which the most-harrowing details were shared with the court. Prosecutor Didier Seban confronted Olivier with photographs of Joanna on a screen projection. The image showed the young woman, posing demurely during a day out in Paris. As he put the picture into her aged hands, he showed her a second set of images showing Joanna's bloated body as it was trawled from a French river.
Before tonight’s verdict, Olivier was already serving a life sentence for complicity in four of the killings and a gang rape committed by Fourniret. She would regularly find victims for Fourniret because ‘she liked to carry out his orders,’ according to prosecution evidence. The pair first got to know each other as pen-pals in 1984, when Fourniret was in prison for sexually assaulting five young girls. In unchecked letters by prison authorities, he told Olivier of his fantasies of raping and murdering young girls.
Summing up on Tuesday, Avocat General Hugues Julie said: ‘She was his perfect accomplice. This couple could be the worst serial killers in the past 50 years in France and Belgium. Raping and murdering was as inconsequential to them as going to the supermarket."
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Joanna Parrish's parents Roger and Pauline (Daily Mirror)Ms Parrish had placed an advert in a local paper offering English lessons, and Fourniret replied to arrange a meeting. claiming he wanted classes for his son Stephanie Pottier, another Avocate General who was prosecuting in Nanterre, said Joanna was deliberately targeted, so as to be defiled and then murdered.
"Olivier was present to reassure this young woman and to get her in the van [that Fourniret used to trap victims]," said Ms Pottier. "Her fate was sealed. Joanna Parrish would still be alive if Monique Olivier hadn't been there on the day of the kidnapping." Her body was found in the River Yonne and a post-mortem showed that Joanna had been raped, beaten and strangled.
Olivier's defence lawyer, Richard Delgenes, told the jury on Tuesday: ‘You will fine her guilty because she recognises the facts. She will not appeal your decision. Today she is on another path, which concerns only her and on this path she makes choices and she chooses to confess. I don’t believe she has two faces – there is only one Monique Olivier."
Back in 2018 when Fourniret confessed to the murder, Joanna's father Roger said: "It's something that we're pleased to hear about. We're relieved in many ways. Let's hope it's something which we can take forward. If we can get that kind of certainty it would be a huge relief. It's the final hurdle that we've faced for the last 27 years. We try to get on with our lives as best we can do. But there are times with it comes back when you least expect. Our lawyers are confident that this has a degree of positivity which we've not had up to now. We're being guarded about it because of our past experience."
Her mother Pauline Murrell told Sky News: "They said she was found in the water, and I was staring out of a window and I simply couldn't take it in. I couldn't cry for six months. Then I got the post-mortem report and I opened it on a Sunday morning, and I wasn't able to get out of bed."
Mr Parrish also reportedly said: "She deserved a long and happy, fulfilled life. She worked hard and she deserved it. She was helpful, part of the community. People still remember her. Jo was a kind person but she was also bright and smart. She was not likely to have trusted a man who was by himself. When we found out that there was a female accomplice, I remember thinking that we had never thought of that. Why would we have done? But right from that moment, I thought, 'this is it - this is the person'."
Life in prison is 22 years in France, but sentences run concurrently, and – with good behaviour – Olivier could technically still be released in 2035, when she will be 86. The attorney generals also called for Olivier to be deprived of all civil, civic and family rights for a period of at least 10 years, on release.
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