Police search for Fourniret victim

23 September 2004

BRUSSELS – Belgian police are searching for the body of an au pair girl believed to have been murdered by self-confessed serial killer Michel Fourniret.

The search for the girl, who would be Fourniret’s 10th victim, resumed on Thursday near the town of Sart-Custinne.

The girl is understood to have disappeared in 1993 after being recruited by Fourniret as an au pair but her identity is still a mystery to police investigators.

Fourniret’s wife Monique Olivier told police her estranged husband killed the au pair and buried her a few kilometres near to their home, but the Frenchman denies the crime.

Police originally abandoned the search for her body but the crown prosecutor of Dinant said new evidence had caused them to revive it.

“New evidence emerged that prompted the examining magistrate to re-launch the investigation… including suspicious sightings by home owners in the area,” he said.

Early on Thursday, police investigators turned up with picks and shovels at the edge of the wood 800 metres from the house where Fourniret lived in the early 1990s.

A pond was also searched later in the day.

Fourniret, 63, has already confessed to nine murders in France and Belgium, seven of which involved young girls.

Despite numerous appeals to the public, the identity of the possible 10th victim remains a mystery.

She is believed to have been around 16 years old, French-speaking and with blond hair.

Subject: Belgian news