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Swiss news weekly L’Hebdo magazine’s 2 June edition features on its cover the murder trial of Cécile Brossard, accused of killing her lover, wealthy French banker Edouard Stern, in 2007. GenevaLunch, a partner of l’Hebdo, brings you the English version in two parts, with an introduction by GL editor Ellen Wallace.

French version © 2009 l’Hebdo

English version © 2009 GenevaLunch (may not be reproduced in part or whole without written permission). Translation: Sean Ecker

Background: The trial of Cécile Brossard for murdering Edouard Stern opens in Geneva 10 June, and is expected to run to 19 June. With 30 journalists accredited, it will likely remain in the headlines for the length of the trial. She has admitted to murdering her lover, divorced banker Edouard Stern, one of France’s wealthiest men, who was 50 at the time of his death in February 2005. The killing – four gunshots at his luxurious apartment in central Geneva – sparked enormous media interest at the time. The story was a hot mix: money, world travel, an on-again off-again affair he had with a woman 16 years his junior who came from a middle-class small-town French background while he came from generations of banking wealth, and then there was the death scene, with the victim found dressed in a head to toe latex suit that was part of their sadomasochistic sexual games. And then tales of his manipulative behaviour began to eke out, while other observers questioned his killer’s words.

The trial adds to this two well-known lawyers and public curiosity about the woman who committed the crime. Swiss media have already warmed up for the trial: the Tribune de Genève writes of obscure plots, disinformation being spread and swissinfo (in French) relates a tale of passion, power and sex. Suisse Illustré asks, diabolical Mata Hari or fragile woman? TSR, which is putting three journalists on the story, has a video blog to follow the trial.

The story according to L’Hebdo:

Part one

By Sabine Pirolt

The trial Cécile Brossard, age 40, mistress of Edouard Stern, will appear at Geneva’s criminal court 10 June for the murder of her lover four years ago, in 2005. The career of an unstable, bruised and scandalous woman who dreamed of joining the jet set.

“Will she make it to trial?” This is the question that Alec Reymond, one of Cécile Brossard’s two lawyers, asks himself of the woman who killed the French banker, Edouard Stern, when Reymond visits her weekly in prison “to keep up her spirits.” From 10-19 June, the Frenchwoman will be on trial for murder at Geneva’s criminal court. She confessed to the crime on the evening of 28 February 2005, in the murdered man’s Geneva apartment. “We are always worried about her. There have been suicide alerts regularly. She has severe bouts of depression and food disorders. Sometimes, she does not eat. Her physical appearance fluctuates between that of a skeleton and normal.”

Sex and power The Frenchwoman has been waiting in the Champ-Dollon prison for her trial for more than four years. She celebrated her 40th birthday there 20 March 2009. “On a good day she can be lively, witty, pleasant. The following day, she can be a wreck.” It is not easy to defend a woman like Cécile Brossard. “She gives us instructions. She absolutely does not want the memory of Edouard Stern damaged or his three children to be involved.” The Frenchwoman is persuaded that her lover speaks to her, that he sends her signs. One of them is that her toiletry bag falls to the ground every day at the same time. “I went to see her today and for the first time she told me: ‘I think Edouard didn’t really love me,’” Alec Reymond explains.

When Edouard Stern’s dead body was discovered on the morning of 1 March 2005, the news made front pages around the world. Shot four times in the head and body, he was dressed in a latex suit. The 38th richest man in France, with an apartment in Geneva, he managed millions, spent a lot of time in his private jet and controlled companies everywhere. He rubbed shoulders with Nicolas Sarkozy as easily as with Laurent Fabius and was on first-name terms with important company executives, like L’Oréal’s Lindsey Owen-Jones.

He was intransigent in his business dealings, and he had enemies. When his death was announced, certain businessmen feared it may have been an execution, and wondered whether they should go into hiding. And yet his death was almost banal: killed by his mistress. The news titillates and has all the ingredients of a bestseller: love, sex, sado-masochism, power, money. Two investigative books have covered the affair, it has inspired a novel, a play and a film.

“Why is Edouard Stern – cultivated, handsome, well-born and intelligent – suddenly dazzled by this Cécile Brossard and completely dependent on her?” demands Marc Bonnant, the lawyer for the civil party. He goes on: “He has exceptional women in his life, yet she is not particularly beautiful.” Others may dispute that and speak of her statuesque body. But she is certainly a woman who knew how to offer certain men what they were looking for: “Let’s explore the limits of our bodies . . .”

Disastrous childhood Cécile Brossard was born in France in a small town about 60 kms from Paris. Her father is in the advertising business, her mother teaches in an institution for handicapped people. Her mother is depressive and regularly ends up in the hospital for attempted suicide, once with her daughters, after putting her head and theirs into the oven. Cécile and her younger sister cannot look to the father for comfort. A debauched old hippie, he makes love in front of his daughters and encourages them to become “sexually liberated” at an early age. The parents get divorced when she is eight years old.

At the age of 10 or 11 she is sexually abused by a maternal uncle. The man’s sister confirms the accusations. As a teenager, Cécile has a hard time, she rebels, misses classes at high school. Her sister remembers that her father “threw her away like an old sock” when she no longer conformed to the ideal image of her that he had. “She becomes an ugly duckling in his eyes,” she continues. At the age of 16, she meets her first great love, a young Swiss man she meets at a retreat for young Christians in Interlaken.

Committed to a psychiatric institution When Cécile was 17, her mother had her committed to a psychiatric institution. She didn’t stay long thanks to her aunt who takes her out and offers her a place in her home. The young girl lives a period of happiness, with schedules and family meals, “wonderful people who don’t talk about sex,” as she puts it in a document her lawyers asked her to write. It is a 60-page document about her life. Her second lawyer, Pascal Maurer, who has known her for four years, explains that “we told her: ‘Take a pen and write.’ Writing can be psychologically liberating. This document was dated and notarized; 90 percent of what is in it has been confirmed by our investigations.”

Cécile begins her professional life without any formal training. She spends a short time in the United States as an au pair, then does odd-jobs in a bar and a luxury leather store at Charles de Gaulle airport. She works in a hotel in England, she has been a call girl. “It comes out in some of her texts,” says Marc Bonnant, the plaintiff’s lawyer.

Kept woman Cécile Brossard was 32 years old when she met Edouard Stern. It was in February 2001 at a dinner organized by a Parisian galleryowner in a restaurant, La Guinguette de Neuilly. The young woman paints and sculpts, she is passionate about art and literature. She is described by her friends as intelligent, very sensitive, a gay soul, nice and devoted. The banker tries to meet her again after having seen her at the dinner. The young woman is married to a French practitioner of natural medicine who lives in Clarens, Vaud and works in Aigle.

It was at her husband’s house 15 March 2005 that she was arrested. They were married in Las Vegas in 1998, two years after first meeting. They signed a pact of fidelity between 1997 and 1999. And even though they haven’t had sexual relations since 2000, “they are still very much friends and he supports her,” adds Pascal Maurer. She is twenty-one years his junior. “I have never been one to be jealous,” the doctor explained during his interrogation.

Just as well for him because a passionate relationship develops very quickly between the young woman and the banker. “They are both excessive. This is not paddling down a river, but sailing on the high seas,” says Marc Bonnant eloquently. Edouard Stern has other women in his life, just as Cécile Brossard has other men in hers. She initiates him into sado-masochist rituals. Marc Bonnant explains: “She would propose this form of love to all the men she met. She would send them an invitation in writing to come on a voyage to far away and unknown countries. The sexual aspect of their story interests many people but it is not the subject of the murder.”

Pascal Bruckner A former lover of the young woman, the writer and philospher Pascal Bruckner remembers her well, when he met her in 1995 on an airplane to Greece. “She was a beautiful, opulent blonde at the time. She had nice curves and was very well-dressed, not like a slut. She wanted to be an artist. She was passionate about art and had read my books. You couldn’t guess that she hadn’t gone to university; conversations with her were very interesting.” Pascal Bruckner describes Cécile as someone full of energy when making love. “She always kept someone at hand . . . she was a libidinous romantic. She was cracked somewhere; there was romanticism in her madness. She was in search of a climax.” The writer adds that he never participated in her journeys to “far-off countries”: “We stuck to the classical missionary position, but I know that she liked to play with a number of others.” By some accounts there was even a “voyage” with an hermaphrodite.

The weak against the strong Cécile admires Edouard, a beautiful, rich, cultivated, brilliant and powerful man. The distance between them was unbridgeable, with him at the top of society, her, the poor little waif, at the other end. And yet she believed it could be done. She saw herself married to Edouard Stern. “For her, he was somewhere between God and Prince Charming,” explains Pascal Maurer. The banker allows her a taste of the good life. But jewels and designer clothes are not her thing. What she loves is travel and the life of the idle rich. She doesn’t work. The banker takes her to the four corners of the world. “She loved scuba-diving,” recalls Albert Benamou. She goes along on his hunting trips, to Africa or elsewhere. “When they came back from these weekends, he would tell her that everyone thought she was stupid. It wasn’t true, of course. He would put her down regularly.”

He was the cold, hard cynic, and she dreamed of opening him up to the world and to human values. His friends warned her that she was racing towards a cliff, but she didn’t listen. “I saw Cécile suffer a great deal. She couldn’t stand it anymore,” says Albert Benamou, who organized the dinner at which the two lovers first met. He tells of the banker’s reputation: “Everyone who knew him knew he manipulated people and pushed them to their limits. You felt with him a wish to hurt her and wound her. He promised to marry her and have children, then broke his promises. He made her suffer, and when that was intolerable for her, he was nice again.”

Albert Benamou remembers Cécile’s last paintings, “very beautiful, created under the influence of suffering, portraits of Edouard, as well.” Before the deterioration in their relationship, she painted in pastel tones, but her last canvases were  blood red and black. She even stuck condoms on some of them.

Cécile intiated Edouard in sado-masochistic practices ; she also acted as a go-between to supply him women she knew– sometimes they did threesomes, sometimes she just watched from a distance – or men. The banker’s sexual appetite was enormous. Their relationship tumultuous. They broke up six or seven times. When she didn’t respond to his calls, he would insist on talking. He harassed her with phone calls, e-mails, text messages. He spied on her with binoculars at her husband’s house in Clarens.

The episode of the million In the autumn of 2004, the young woman was no longer content with words of love: she wanted deeds. She sent him a text message telling him that she wanted him to marry her. As proof of his love, she asked him to make her independent by giving her a sum of money, otherwise she would leave him. “He must have felt that he had pushed her to her limits, and that she wouldn’t go any farther. She was so weak that he wouldn’t have been able to go on like that for years,” declares Alec Reymond. The banker didn’t know how to respond. “He was like a little boy, this captain of industry,” says Marc Bonnant.

In the middle of the night, he asked his business partner to come to give him advice; he tells Stern to write her a letter promising to marry her and to give her one million dollars. He does it.

Days pass and he doesn’t keep his word. Since he doesn’t transfer her the money, she leaves him. A few weeks later, she writes him a text message telling him what a pity it was that he didn’t keep his promise, because for her the “million was symbolic,” it would have demonstrated his love for her. She would have transferred it back within the day. Edouard Stern believes her and has the dollars transferred to an account with Crédit Suisse in Montreux 12 January 2005. Days pass and she doesn’t send the money back. He tries to reach her. They fight. Get back together. Leave together for New York. Everything seems to be all right. On 21 February, still no sign of the money, he becomes enraged, calls her a thief on the phone. He has the money impounded by the authorities under false pretenses. He tells her this at a dinner for two in Geneva Friday evening 25 February. Cécile is unsure whether to believe him.

She has to wait till Monday to find out that he wasn’t lying. She is very angry at the impoundment. She wants to talk about it with her lover. They agree to meet that evening.

She goes to his place in Geneva with her sado-masochistic paraphernalia. He tells her again that he is prepared to sue her. They begin their sexual romp. He is seated astride a chair, his hands tied. She slips on her tights. He is an amateur of guns and has five about the house. At one point, he is supposed to have said: “A million is a lot to pay for a whore!”

Is it true, or is Cécile making it up?

Filled with rage, she finds one of the guns and shoots him between the eyes. The man has the strength to get up and take a few steps. She follows him and shoots him twice in the body. He falls on his side. She finishes him off with a bullet to his temple.

Next: Part two, timeline