The Chilean is accused of killing, in December 2016, his ex-girlfriend Narumi Kurosaki, a Japanese student in Besançon, and makes his body disappear.
Le Monde
The Advocate General, Etienne Coats, required, Monday, April 11, before the Assize Court of Doubs (Burgundy-Franche-Comté) The perpetuity criminal imprisonment against Nicolas Zepeda, judged for the assassination in 2016 of Narumi Kurosaki, 21 years old, his former Japanese girlfriend, whose body has never been found.
Earlier in the day, lawyers from the civil parties had asked the Court to recognize the guilt of Nicolas Zepeda, despite the denials of the Chilean, which they qualify as a “liar”. “These are the useful tears of the civil party that you need to privilege by condemning the one in the box, Nicolas Zepeda,” said Sylvie Galley, the lawyer of the family of Narumi Kurosaki.
Wednesday, the heartbreaking testimony of the victim’s mother had upset the courtroom. Coming from Tokyo, Taeko Kurosaki had expressed her pain, exacerbated by the uncertainty that remains on the fate of the young woman. When M me Galley evoked the missing, “mute forever”, M me Kurosaki curled up; Since the beginning of the trial, on March 29, she holds tight against her a photo of her carefully wrapped daughter in a flowering fabric.
“Narumi wrote on July 17, 2016:” Nicolas, I am so proud (…), you are certainly the best boy in my life. “Five months later, the best boy took her life,” said M me galley. “The death of Narumi could (…) extend the list of femicides”, but “the disappearance of his body” has tilt the scenario “into the absolute horror”, continued the lawyer, in front of a public came in numbers .
A “particularly strong emotional audience”
On the bench of the accused, Nicolas Zepeda remained impassive throughout the morning, which claimed his innocence during the first nine days of his trial.
He “At all the latitude to make Narumi Kurosaki tell what he wants. We are not a lie, a denial, a contradiction in this case,” lamented the lawyer.
“Liar, manipulator, toxic”, also accused Randall Schwerdorffer, Arthur del Piccolo lawyer, the French boyfriend of the Japanese student at the time of his disappearance. According to the lawyer, the Chilean perpetrated “a crime of coolness”, premeditated, as shown by the purchase of a bin of 5 liters of fuel and a match box before the disappearance of Narumi Kurosaki. “Mr. Zepeda does everything to conceal his responsibility,” he regretted. The hand of Nicolas Zepeda did not graze and I would ask that Assize Court not to tremble when she will make his decision. “
In force or smoothly, all the actors of the trial have attempted to obtain confessions from Nicolas Zepeda, including his own lawyer. But the question remains entire: what happened to Narumi Kurosaki on the night of 4 to 5 December 2016, in this narrow room 106 of a university residence of Besançon? What has happened this brilliant 21-year-old woman?
This “particularly strong emotional audience”, according to the words of the President of the Court, Matthieu Husson, Friday, will not have brought an answer. Nicolas Zepeda denied from end to end any responsibility in the disappearance of his ex-girlfriend. “I did not kill Narumi! I too want to know!”, Has he ended up screaming, in tears.
Extraded from his country in the summer of 2020, the Chilean will have, as the rule wants, the speech last Tuesday, before the jurors retire to deliberate and return their verdict.
