A woman dies of mercury poisoning in France, her ex arrested

UPGRADE DAY

A 50-year-old man was arrested in Paris on Tuesday, suspected of having murdered his ex-companion Catherine D. who died poisoned on Thursday January 19, AFP learned on Wednesday from judicial sources familiar with the matter.

The interrogation was still in progress Wednesday evening in the premises of the Parisian PJ criminal brigade, indicates the judicial source, confirming information from the Parisian.

According to the daily, the motive of this possible feminicide would be the man's refusal to break up the couple.

Catherine D., a 46-year-old entrepreneur residing in the north of the capital, reportedly began to complain in the fall of violent headaches and overwhelming fatigue, before being hospitalized in mid-October, according to the newspaper.

While the doctors saw her condition deteriorating, the Pitié-Salpétrière hospital allegedly received many messages from his ex-companion suggesting that they investigate the lead of mercury poisoning.

This poisoning has was finally corroborated by a toxicological analysis, which dated it several months earlier.

The doctors' report to the courts triggered the opening by the Paris prosecutor's office of a judicial investigation on 18 January for “premeditated poisoning”. A crime is punishable by life.

Still according to the Parisian, the search of the suspect's home, in which his ex-partner and their two young children lived before their separation, would have made it possible to update empty bottles of a toxic product based on mercury.

In 2021, 122 women were killed in France by the blows of their spouse or ex-spouse, according to figures from the Ministry of Interior.