French police ‘rejected’ domestic violence complaint against man who later murdered his wife 

French police at a press conference about Magali Blandin's murder

Credit: AFP

Anti-domestic violence groups have expressed outrage over the case of a woman murdered by her husband just months after a domestic violence complaint she made against him was thrown out by police. 

On Friday, Jerome Gaillard confessed to police that he struck his wife Magali Blandin with a baseball bat outside her apartment near the western city of Rennes, then disposed of her body in the nearby woods. He admitted the murder was premeditated. Ms Blandin had been missing since mid-February.

The couple, who have four children, was in the middle of divorce proceedings when she disappeared. In his confession, Gaillard claimed he was shocked when she left him last autumn.

“There was a lack of communication, she had left overnight without any explanation,” Gaillard said while in custody. According to Gaillard’s lawyer, the 45-year-old “found himself at a psychological dead end.”

Ms Blandin, a school teacher, had filed a formal domestic violence complaint against Gaillard shortly after she left him in September, but it was thrown out by the police.

“This is unfortunately not an isolated case,” said Caroline De Haas, a leading French feminist and head of the anti-domestic violence group #NousToutes, or All of Us Women. “We have a serious problem in France with how the police treat these kinds of cases.

She added: "If they had taken [Ms Blandin’s] complaint seriously to begin with, she might still be alive.”

According to De Haas, 90 per cent of domestic violence complaints made in France are thrown out by the police.

Femicide has been a major issue in the country in recent years, with one woman being killed by her male partner every two days on average in 2019. The figure decreased in 2020.   

The public prosecutor in Rennes said the details of the case were “of very great complexity.” Investigators believe Gaillard began planning the murder last November, when he allegedly paid several people in the Georgian community 20,000 euros to kill Blandin.

Gaillard’s parents were also charged with “complicity in murder by a spouse” and placed in detention over the weekend, though the details remain unclear. Gaillard’s lawyer says his client was “the one and only person responsible for this crime.”