Serial killer fails to stop French TV biopic

PARIS, March 9 (AFP) – A French serial killer on Wednesday lost his legal bid to stop a drama based on his life being broadcast on the country’s most popular television channel.  

At an emergency hearing in the western Paris suburb of Nanterre, a court authorised the privately-owned TF1 to broadcast a film based on the life of Francis Heaulme, a 45 year-old who has been convicted of nine murders.  

However it told the channel to transmit a 20-second legal statement before the showing of “In the head of the killer” on Thursday evening.  

Heaulme’s lawyers argued that the biopic breaches France’s strict privacy laws because it was made without his assent. They also said it flouts the presumption of innocence because it links Heaulme with two 1986 murders for which he has not been convicted.   The court conceded the second point but said to ban the programme would be an excessive response.  

Instead it said TF1 must broadcast a statement admitting that Heaulme’s right to be presumed innocent had been breached. It also told the channel to pay the killer’s legal costs.