Marie Besnard

See also: Besnard

Marie Besnard (August 15th 1896 - February 14th 1980), called the “Good Lady of Loudun”, an imposing woman but with a voice of young girl, was suspected of being a serial killer and remains in the center of one of the legal enigmas French of the 20th century.

It is the July 21st 1949 which Marie Besnard, of her name of young girl Filipino Marie Joséphine Davaillaud, is accused of murder: twelve poisoned people, of which his/her own husband.

The history occurs in the small city from Loudun (8 000 inhabitants at the time of the facts), where the business Urbain Grandier (born in 1590, and died on roughing-hew it of Loudun in 1634) had made great noise a few centuries before. One observes several similarities between these two businesses, of which the very significant part of the Rumeur S; rumors which played in the arrest of Marie Besnard as in that of Urbain Grandier. It is what Frederic Pottecher underlines, legal chronicler with radio operator of the lawsuit of Marie Besnard, in the foreword of the book Us, Urbain Grandier and Martin Guerre, condemned and carried out (edition the Seek-Moon). The two marked ones never gave any information being able to be retained against them. Marie Besnard was described like “abnormally normal” by the Psychiatrie.

After three lawsuits, the first with Poitiers, which lasted more than ten years, Besnard, shown and threatened of the capital punishment, was released in 1954 then discharged by the Court of Assizes of the Gironde the December 12th 1961.

This legal circular mobilized whole France during a whole decade; it is, with the business Marie Lafarge, one of the most astonishing enigmas of Empoisonnement.

Died in series

The Besnard business begins with dead from Leon Besnard, on October 25th, 1947 with Loudun; its death was allotted to a crisis of Urémie.

A few days after the burial, Mrs. Pintou, friend and Locataire of the Besnard husbands, entrusted to a close relation that Leon Besnard, before dying, had entrusted to him: “that his wife had served to him as soup in a plate where found already a liquid”. The details of this testimony were made available of the gendarmerie then to an examining magistrate which diligenta the exhumation of the body of Leon Besnard, on May 11th, 1949.

The taking away were dispatched with a Medical examiner Marseilles, Doctor Béroud, who discovered in the internal organs of Leon Besnard 19,45 pure arsenic Mg.

An investigation of police force, continuation in particular to a Burgling occurred at Mrs. Pintou, as well as the Testimony of many inhabitants of Loudun, drew the attention of the Magistrat S and the population to many the Décè S which have occurred in the entourage of Marie Besnard, namely:

on July 1st, 1927: Auguste Antigny (33 years), cousin and first husband of Marie Besnard, declared died of Tuberculosis. In his remainders, exhumed, one discovered 60 arsenic Mg;
on August 22nd, 1938: Marie Lecomte, born Labrèche (86 years), great-aunt by alliance of Marie Besnard. In his remainders, exhumed, one discovered 35 arsenic Mg;
on July 14th, 1939, All Saints' day Rivet (64 years), friend of the Besnard husbands. In his remainders, one discovered 18 arsenic Mg;
on December 27th, 1941, White Rivet, born Lebeau (49 years), widow of All Saints' day Rivet, officially deceased of a Aortite. Its remainders contained 30 arsenic Mg;
on May 14th, 1940, Pierre Davaillaud (78 years), father of Marie Besnard, officially died of stroke. Its remainders contained 36 arsenic Mg;
on September 2nd, 1940, Louise Gouin, born Labrèche (92 years), maternal grandmother of Leon Besnard. The very small quantity of arsenic collected in its internal organs excludes this death from the list of the victims and was not retained by the charge;
on November 19th, 1940, Marcellin Besnard (78 years), father-in-law of Marie Besnard. Its remainders contained 48 arsenic Mg;
on January 16th, 1941, Marie-Louise Besnard, born Gouin (68 years), mother-in-law of Marie Besnard. Its remainders contained 60 arsenic Mg;
on March 27th, 1941, Lucie Bodin born Besnard (45 years), sister-in-law of Leon Besnard, found hung at her. Its remainders contained 30 arsenic Mg;
on July 1st, 1945, Pauline Bodineau, born Lalleron (88 years), cousin of Leon Besnard. Its remainders contained 48 arsenic Mg;
on July 9th, 1945, Virginia Lalleron, sister of Pauline (83 years). Its remainders contained 20 arsenic Mg;
on January 16th, Marie-Louise Davaillaud, born Antigny (71 years), mother of Marie Besnard. Its remainders contained 48 arsenic Mg.

Two Mobile S appeared obvious with the Examining magistrate:

the money , Marie Besnard having directly or indirectly collected by heritage the goods of all these people; She has and manages nevertheless in addition a prosperous factory of cord. These goods are seized what does not make it possible the defendant to pay her setting in release on bail. Charles Trenet proposes to pay it.
passion , Marie Besnard having, appears it, tied a particularly close relation with old a German Prisonnier , Alfred Dietz, that the Besnard husbands had preserved like Tâcheron.

Consigned in detail in the Bill of indictment, all these elements led to the Inculpation of Marie Besnard for poisoning, with the aggravating circumstance of Parricide and Matricide.

Lawsuit with bounces

Evidence

The report/ratio of autopsy, established by Doctor Béroud on the basis of analysis carried out thanks to the Method of Marsh and Cribier, concludes with acute poisonings following from the slow Intoxication S, been dependant on Imprégnation S Exogène S of Arsenic.

Other toxicological analyzes were carried out by professors Fabre, Kohn-Abrest and Griffon in 1952 and concluded with the same abnormal presence from arsenic in the taking away carried out at the time of the exhumation of the corpses.

A report/ratio of professor Piedelièvre, establishes in 1954, confirmed the conclusions of the analyzes of 1952 but was shown more moderate than that of Doctor Béroud.

A report/ratio of the professor Frederic Joliot-Curie confirmed the abnormally high presence of arsenic in these same taking away.

Payment

The first reason of the payment holds with the attitude of Doctor Béroud itself: disputed, it was defended with difficulty vis-a-vis lawyers of Marie Besnard.

Defense put forward also that errors of labelling in the bottles containing the taking away had been made, certain bottles being able to be lost or replaced.

An investigation with the cemetery of Loudun made it possible to show that the sulphating of the flowers, the zinc of the funerary ornaments could have saturated the ground with the arsenic cemetery.

The length of the lawsuit, the deterioration of the evidence (the last lawsuit taking place in 1961), the reversal of the public opinion, wearied, led to the payment owing to lack of Marie Besnard.

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