Hamida Djandoubi (Arabic: حميدة جندوبي‎; September 22, 1949 – September 10, 1977) was a Tunisian agricultural worker and convicted murderer. He moved to Marseille, France, in 1968 and six years later he kidnapped, tortured and murdered 22-year-old Élisabeth Bousquet, his former girlfriend. He was sentenced to death in February 1977 and executed by guillotine in September that year. He was the last person to be executed in Western Europe^[2] and the last person legally executed by beheading in the Western world. Marcel Chevalier served as chief executioner.^[3]

Early life[edit]

Born in Tunisia on September 22, 1949, Djandoubi started living in Marseille in 1968, working in a grocery store. He later worked as a landscaper but had a workplace accident in 1971 that resulted in the loss of two-thirds of his right leg.^[4]

In 1973, a 21-year-old woman named Elisabeth Bousquet, whom Djandoubi had met in the hospital while recovering from his amputation, filed a complaint against him, stating that he had tried to force her into prostitution.^[4]

Murder of Elisabeth Bousquet[edit]

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After his arrest and eventual release from custody during the spring of 1973, Djandoubi drew two other young girls into his confidence and then forced them to "work" for him. On July 3, 1974, he kidnapped Bousquet and took her into his home where, in full view of the terrified girls, he beat the woman before stubbing a lit cigarette all over her breasts and genital area. Bousquet survived the ordeal so he took her by car to the outskirts of Marseille and strangled her there.

On his return, Djandoubi warned the two girls to say nothing of what they had seen. Bousquet's body was discovered in a shed by a boy on July 7, 1974. One month later, he kidnapped another girl who managed to escape and report him to police.

Trial and execution[edit]

After a lengthy pre-trial process, Djandoubi eventually appeared in court in Aix-en-Provence on charges of torture-murder, rape, and premeditated violence on February 24, 1977. His main defense revolved around the supposed effects of the amputation of his leg six years earlier which his lawyer claimed had driven him to a paroxysm of alcohol abuse and violence, turning him into a different man.

On February 25 he was sentenced to death. An appeal against his sentence was rejected on June 9. In the early morning of September 10, 1977, twelve days before his 28th birthday, Djandoubi was informed that he, like the child murderers Christian Ranucci (guillotined on July 28, 1976) and Jérôme Carrein (guillotined on June 23, 1977), had not received a reprieve from President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing. Shortly afterwards, at 4:40 a.m., he was executed by guillotine at Baumettes Prison in Marseille.

While Djandoubi was the last person executed in France, he was not the last condemned.^[5] No more executions occurred after capital punishment was abolished in France in 1981 following the election of François Mitterrand.^[6]

Further reading[edit]

• Jeremy Mercer, When the Guillotine Fell : The Bloody Beginning and Horrifying End to France's River of Blood, 1791–1977, New York, St. Martin's Press, 2008


• Jean-Yves Le Nahour, Le Dernier guillotiné, Paris, First Editions, 2011
  

References[edit]

External links[edit]

• 
  Various photos, newspaper articles, and court documents related to the Djandoubi case (in English)
  


• 
  Le Dernier Guillotiné, directed by Cédric Condom, based on the book by Jean-Yves Le Nahour, Planète+ Justice, 2011