Monique Olivier: ex-wife of 'ogre' serial killer goes on trial

The French woman is charged with complicity in Michel Fourniret's murder of British student Joanna Parrish and two other victims

Monique Olivier and Michel Fourniret
Monique Olivier was married to Michel Fourniret, dubbed the 'ogre of the Ardennes', who died in prison in 2021
(Image credit: Getty Images)

The ex-wife of French serial killer Michel Fourniret has gone on trial today over her alleged role in three murders including the 1990 killing of British student Joanna Parrish.

Monique Olivier is already serving a life sentence for her part in four other murders and a rape committed by Fourniret, who was dubbed the "ogre of the Ardennes" after unleashing a "17-year campaign of kidnaps and killings that traumatised France", said The Guardian

For decades, said Le Monde, France has been "simultaneously repelled and fascinated" by Fourniret, who was jailed for life in 2008 for the murder of seven girls and young women. He also admitted killing three more including 20-year-old Parrish, but died in 2021 before he could face trial.

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The French woman is charged with aiding and abetting the kidnapping and murder of Parrish and an 18-year-old, Marie-Angèle Domèce, who disappeared on her way home from school in 1988. She is also accused of complicity in the 2003 disappearance of nine-year-old Estelle Mouzin, whose body has never been found.

A lawyer for the Parrish and Mouzin families, said they hoped she would be tried in her own right "as the co-author of their misfortune", and not regarded simply as an accomplice.

Now aged 75, Olivier was jailed for life in 2008 and was handed a further 20 years in 2018 for her role in the killing of Farida Hammiche, the wife of one of Fourniret's former cellmates.

She was the subject of a Netflix series called "Monique Olivier: Accessory to Evil", which described her as an "enigma" and explored whether she was a "pawn or a participant".

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Chas Newkey-Burden has been part of The Week Digital team for more than a decade and a journalist for 25 years, starting out on the irreverent football weekly 90 Minutes, before moving to lifestyle magazines Loaded and Attitude. He was a columnist for The Big Issue and landed a world exclusive with David Beckham that became the weekly magazine’s bestselling issue. He now writes regularly for The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Independent, Metro, FourFourTwo and the i new site. He is also the author of a number of non-fiction books.