Overview
- A juge d'instruction at Nanterre's pôle "cold cases" ordered on Tuesday that Heaulme be sent to the Cour d'assises des Hauts-de-Seine following requisitions from the parquet.
- The case concerns the August 1989 killing of 60-year-old agricultural repairman Jean-Joseph Clément, who was found with his skull fractured by a stone in Bédarrides.
- Heaulme previously confessed twice then retracted, benefited from a 2002 ordonnance de non-lieu, and was recharged after the investigation was reopened in July 2023.
- Francis Heaulme is a convicted serial killer who has been imprisoned since 1992 with definitive convictions in eleven homicides after the Cour de cassation rejected his appeal in 2020.
- The victim’s family welcomed the remand and their lawyers, citing Heaulme’s grave health and an April hospitalization, are urging a trial as soon as late 2026 or early 2027 though no date is set.