Elie Wajeman Interview | Alex Gilbert #261 | Alexandre Gilbert

Confounded by his DNA, François Vérove, known as ‘Le Grêlé,’ ended his life in September 2021 after 35 years on the run. Starting on September 24, 2024, Elie Wajeman, son of psychoanalyst Gérard Wajeman, and french journalist Patricia Tourancheau present the documentary Insoupçonnable: le psychiatre et le tueur on France 2.

There are many audiovisual references connected to Vérove; he was nicknamed Fernandel, underwent Top Gun style training, watched Cannibal Holocaust, and appeared on Tout le monde veut prendre sa place, Nagui’s TV game show. How does an image professional analyze this?

Elie Wajeman: I wasn’t aware of the references to Fernandel and Top Gun. As for Cannibal Holocaust, we included it as part of the narrative that extended his macabre fantasies, but ultimately, it was deeply tied to his psyche as a serial killer. Narcissism plays a significant role here, though I hadn’t directly linked it to his enjoyment of being filmed. When he appears on Nagui’s show, there may be an element of narcissism at play. What we highlight in the psychological analysis of him, and other serial killers, is their pronounced narcissism. A striking image is from Chaplin’s The Great Dictator, where the dictator plays with an exploding globe. It perfectly symbolizes the serial killer: a master of others’ destinies, yet whose grand fantasies inevitably crumble.

I also noticed you have a fascination with characters on the verge, like Adèle Haenel in Aliyah, or Adèle Exarchopoulos in The Anarchists. Even in The Bureau. Where does it come from, and what are your cinematic references?

Elie Wajeman: I tend to write about divided, fragmented characters in search of unity. In The Bureau, for instance, Mathieu Kassovitz’s character is torn between his love and his duty as a spy. This theme might stem from my interest in psychoanalysis. Similarly, François Vérove is a man split between being a model family man and a serial killer, which is why we often reference Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. In terms of influences, I have a deep admiration for Rocco and His Brothers, a film that blends genres, and the New Hollywood cinema, like Coppola’s work. These filmmakers frequently portray complex, divided characters—Al Pacino in The Godfather, for example, or Gene Hackman in The French Connection, where he plays a hyper-violent cop. Another notable example is Prince of the City by Sidney Lumet.

Another divided character in the François Vérove case is Carine Hutsebaut, who claimed to be from the FBI Academy at Quantico and convinced Jean-Pierre Bloch that the murderer had to be antisemitic because three of the victims had Jewish names. Was that the case in your opinion?

Elie Wajeman:

No, he certainly wasn’t. He was simply a serial killer obsessed with his own fantasies, not with issues of Judaism. Carine Hutsebaut, despite her occasional insights, was completely mistaken in this case. François Vérove was indifferent to ethnic or religious questions. He targeted a Black woman and a young Maghrebian girl, but his interests lay elsewhere. In our documentary, we illustrate how he was captivated by the large, dehumanized architectures of the 1970s—an aspect that fascinated him far more than the backgrounds of his victims.^

François Vérove was a Republican Guard, François Vérove practiced the ‘Spanish garrote,’ listened to records of French Algeria, and was part of the far-right network Alliance Police Nationale, led by his friend Denis Jacob, with whom he sometimes spent New Year’s Eve. Was he essentially racist ?

Elie Wajeman: In everyday life, I’m not sure. This guy, no one really knew him, he was an old-timer on the far-right, probably very ‘franchouillard’ [typically French]. However, he didn’t seem involved in extremist groups. We didn’t find any far-right literature in his possession. He may have been a typical voter for the National Front.

But at that time, this could imply a closeness to more radical movements.

Elie Wajeman: He wasn’t a militant of that stature. When he started killing, raping, wandering like a ghost in Paris, he was only 24. He wasn’t yet politically engaged; that came later, with his career in the police, where a certain level of racism might have grown. This applies to thousands of police officers, but I don’t think it went any further. He was more of an average cop, somewhat racist, but not an activist. What stands out is that he was a serial killer, ultra-violent and meticulous, without ideological or conspiratorial motives. There was nothing but his perverse and violent fantasies. He was a lone killer, and his violence was drawn to violent images. He killed three people, raped, but wasn’t a prolific serial killer.

Recently, investigations suggest he could be linked to two other murders committed in 1987, that of Virginie Delmas and Périne Vigneron.

Elie Wajeman: But all we know comes from scientific evidence, like DNA, which corroborates the facts. There are still many gray areas in this case, but everything shown in the series is true. Daniel Zagury, who analyzed his case, suggests that this murderer was shaped by his past, particularly by abuse suffered from his father. Vérove likely resolved some of his hatred towards his father, which could explain why he stopped killing after 1993-1994. This hypothesis, though incomplete, seems plausible and challenges the idea that serial killers can’t stop.

I’m not Patricia Tourancheau, I don’t have her expertise. I’m a director. I’ve closed the file on ‘Le Grêlé.’ And it’s very possible there are more murders. What’s not possible is that what we say in the series is false. Everything is true. It’s backed by scientific evidence, called DNA. DNA and testimonies that are ultra, ultra, ultra strong. I think we’ve made no mistakes. There are certainly huge gray areas left, but that’s to be expected.

We also know that this man was sexually abused by his father, which may have deeply influenced his behavior. He married a psychologist and even tried to join the Montpellier juvenile brigade. By the end of the documentary, a clearer picture emerges: that of a divided man, with a psychoneurotic profile.

Elie Wajeman: The idea that psychotherapy might have helped him overcome his murderous urges is a strong hypothesis in this documentary. It could explain why he stopped killing, while still having violent fantasies. We’re getting there. I think we’ve done a good job with a TV piece. I don’t think any French TV production has gone this far in the accuracy or profiling of a serial killer. And so… We’re being very honest because we present hypotheses. Daniel Zagury advances carefully; he doesn’t assert stupid things; he thinks things through and presents well-told hypotheses that seem true. But we’re not claiming absolute truth because there’s a point where things still escape understanding. Yes, we suggest that he couldn’t get over the abuse. We hypothesize that he resolved something regarding his father, something about his hatred for his father that he dealt with just before his father’s death, which may have allowed him to free himself a bit from his murderous urges, while still remaining a serial killer at heart but no longer needing to act on it. That’s our strongest hypothesis. Over time, this could prove wrong, but what we’re saying is that he probably stopped at a certain point. And we explain why he might have stopped.

Which somewhat challenges the very concept of the serial killer being under a kind of curse.

Elie Wajeman: Exactly. And it’s probably something verifiable. There may be new testimonies that will show he killed during that period, but I don’t believe it. I think we’ll find more victims, possibly, but it will always be from the same period. I believe that from 1993-1994, something was truly resolved in him. He continued to fantasize in a very violent way, but I think he managed to no longer need to kill or rape. That’s one of the big psychoanalytic hypotheses we put forward, that in Vérove’s specific history, he was able to free himself by confronting his demons through psychoanalysis.

Did he undergo psychoanalysis?

Elie Wajeman: We know he saw someone.

In Mindhunter, I don’t know if you’ve seen it, they talk about this, that the FBI actually draws on Freudian theory to delve into childhood demons, etc., to identify patterns. Is that something that influenced you?

Elie Wajeman: “Completely. Also, I’m the son of a psychoanalyst, so it definitely resonates with me, and Mindhunter was a significant reference for me. But not just visually, though the atmosphere is incredibly intense and well-crafted. It’s also because it deals with childhood narratives and considers theories as subjects. Our demonstration, which is simple in the end but goes through many complex aspects, shows that these people are part of humanity. They’re twisted like other humans, but a path opened up to them that’s completely deranged, yet they are part of humanity. What I like about Mindhunter is that it’s not behaviorist; it’s not just about the brain or DNA. It’s about subjects, and something went wrong in them. What’s beautiful in Mindhunter is how this not-dumb but somewhat robotic cop meets an intellectual woman. The story of Mindhunter is about a guy who falls in love with an intellectual and, with her, starts reading literature, including Freud. He starts to think that maybe we should look into these people through dialogue, without relying on numbers, mathematics, or computer science. It’s all about discussion, and that’s what Daniel Zagury did. That’s why we went to see him. Daniel Zagury met more than 13 serial killers in prison, and through dialogue and the tools of psychiatry and psychoanalysis, he listened to these people and identified patterns and recurring elements. Vérove, and what was fascinating about this case, is that he is unique in France. There are other serial killers who are even more frightening, monsters, but Vérove was integrated into society in France.” It doesn’t exist, so in that sense it’s certain that it was exciting to do. Essentially, what’s novel is its normalcy. Normalcy, it’s Mr. “tout-le-monstre”. That’s a phrase from Zagury. He is normal, even his sexuality with his wife was relatively normal. He was a guy who was very cold, very discreet. He was a loser, he messed up his career. He is a crappy guy, a little pathetic guy. But there’s one thing where he shone brightly, it’s that he’s a hell of a serial killer and that’s his secret. And that makes him very, very, very proud of it. It’s certain, he loved being a serial killer. He was the king of Paris. I think Paris is an important universe. The encounter with a city.

In these highly “sublimated zones”, a term from psychoanalysis, such as the parking lots, endless corridors, suburbs, 70’s architectures like those of Le Corbusier, Le Havre with more emptiness than life he will find that fascinates his perversion and make his psychosis explode.

Elie Wajeman: Yes, that’s exactly it, it sublimates him. In fact, a serial killer, that’s what we’ll teach the viewers, is that the serial killer doesn’t enjoy killing or raping. There, he destroys a human and especially a woman because it’s like those woman killers. We must also recall the hatred of women. That’s what aligns him. But the moment when the guy is in perverse ecstasy, it’s the moment when he wanders through these architectures. And you say you’re talking about Le Corbusier, Le Havre and all that’s great, but I just say there’s a great tower rising towards the sky and this great tower rising towards the sky, let’s say the Olympiades or the Place des Fêtes, underneath there are all these dark networks which are the basements. And this relationship between the thing that goes up to the sky and the basements, it’s certain that this guy, it turned him on quickly.

Besides, Olympiades was built by Michel Holley, a student of Le Corbusier, a modernist like the Brazilian architect Oskar Niemeyer.

Elie Wajeman: Vérove he sees himself as an artist, a stereotype of television series. He was really not an artist, but on the other hand, he has a relationship to what Daniel Zagury describes beautifully, which is the “élation” (elevation), going upwards. It’s really that. They have walls. The second crime he commits in the Marais is not a 70s architecture, but the second crime which is at Rue de Saint-Croix-de-la-Bretonnerie, he will commit ultra-violent crimes, really like in Seven. It’s clear. We put Daniel Zagury in a library in reference to Seven and he will see Italian painting with bodies to glorify notably Jesus but also Saint Sebastian, and he certainly references that and thinks of himself as God. Vérove has nothing in mind, the church, the bodies, the cry of Saint-Croix, the blood. I’m not saying conspiracy theorist, far-right or antisemitic. He went to church, he got married in church and wants to see himself as God. He’s this crappy guy, never loved by anyone.

Seven, from David Fincher portrays an apocalyptic vision typical from the 70s, science fiction no longer epic like in Alien, Blade Runner.

Elie Wajeman: I don’t know if he was aware of all this. We don’t know, the series says so too. We don’t even know at what time we imagine the time at which he hunted, even if that word is awful. It makes perfect sense. When he hunts, Guy Georges will tell Zagury in an interview that he was like a tiger in the jungle. They’re all hunters, it’s their trip. We know it’s between noon and two because he knows that the kids are coming back from school and also in the morning. But we can’t figure out how he managed to return to the Republican Guard. He must have left at 7 a.m., wandered around Paris, spotted victims, committed crimes or not, but at least just wandered. To me, it was already a great thing for him to wander and imagine scenarios. But we don’t know exactly. He left at 7 a.m. and returned at 8:20 a.m. He took his shift, how it worked. It’s not certain, we’ll never really know.

Being a Republican Guard, we saw it during the Olympics, an escort of the president of the republic, behind Mitterand must have been something too.

Elie Wajeman: We searched for him thoroughly. We looked through plenty of archives. At one point, we even thought we saw him. We used a lot of archives. The guy is a ghost, there are very few things. I put a lot of archives of the Republican Guard. We see them all decked out with their frills, their super costumes. He must have been thrilled when he was with the president. He was a super soldier of the republic. He was going to defend the orders of the republic, that’s for sure. He didn’t think of himself as a serial killer. It’s not to say he’s schizophrenic. If he reflects at night when he comes home, he still knows that in the morning he did this. He’s not crazy. He’s not bipolar either. He’s split. He finds a system. It’s what the FBI, the real FBI guys, quickly said, it’s called Undoing. It’s serial killers who do something with their victim, cover them with a sheet or cardboard found in the street, close the victim’s eyes, turn their back on the person they raped or killed, and thus the switch to the other person is made. It’s called Undoing. It didn’t happen.