Michel Pialle is the main suspect in the disappearance of his wife, Karine Esquivillon. He has been in custody since June 14. The testimonies of his entourage flow and allow to know more about this man considered “dangerous” by the court of Beauvais in 2003.
The Karine Esquivillon affair is experiencing a new twist. This 54-year-old woman has been missing since March 27. Her husband, Michel Pialle, is the last person to have seen her alive. On Wednesday June 14, the gendarmes of the Nantes research section arrested him at his home and placed him in police custody. The police carried out a new search of the family home, located in Maché (Vendée), for nearly eight hours according to France Bleu.
The La Roche-sur-Yon prosecutor’s office has extended its judicial investigation “against X for kidnapping and forcible confinement” to “acts of murder against X”. The husband’s custody was extended Thursday, June 15. The two investigating judges in charge of the case therefore seem to favor the thesis of a murder disguised as voluntary departure. Michel Pialle is still presumed innocent at this stage of the investigation.
Michel Pialle defends the track of a flight from his wife. On April 3, he reported to the gendarmerie the disappearance of Karine Esquivillon a week apart. He said he didn’t feel “worried” because he said he thought his wife would be back soon. His lawyer, Antoine Ory, spoke on BFMTV on June 14. He indicated that his client “expected” this detention: “He is not surprised, it is a step he expected since it is common in this type of case that husbands suspected. He expected it and psychologically he was prepared for it.”
In a report from Seven to Eight, this 51-year-old autoentrepreneur referred to cases of feminicides: “There were the disappearances of Daval, of Jubillar, I understand all that, but I am as worried as all the others and each passing day worries me a little more.” The main lead of the investigation suspects that Michel Pialle “could have feared that his companion would leave him soon”. The gendarmes would consider that he exercised a form of influence over his wife.
Michel Pialle was born in the 18th arrondissement of Paris on October 5, 1971. He was already the father of two children before meeting Karine Esquivillon with whom he had three other children. After his divorce in 2003, he met Karine in the Paris region. They go to live in Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie in Vendée, before moving to Karine’s original village in Maché.
The judicial past of Michel Pialle is revealed in the press which multiplies the articles about him over the course of the investigation. This man even made the front page of Le Parisien this Thursday, June 15. The regional daily explains that this man “is a regular in police custody: his criminal record bears several charges, nine precisely between 1998 and 2021, in particular for scams” related to his work as a second-hand dealer. A complaint related to fake gold bars had been dismissed two years ago.
His antecedents with justice underline a man with a mythomaniacal tendency. In 2003, his ex-wife sought to obtain sole custody of their two children, relatives testified in his favor before the Beauvais court. “I saw my brother-in-law Michel Pialle pretend to become a billionaire thanks to a computer project, promise my mother a large sum of money, which allowed him to strip her of all her possessions”, advanced his sister-in-law .
Michel’s father was on the same line in court. He then told the magistrates that his son “after I don’t know how many false documents, false cash receipts, stolen credit cards, ended up abandoning his wife and two children in front of a hotel where he owed 30,000 francs. He was hospitalized so as not to have to report to justice.”
At that time, Michel Pialle multiplied the lies about his financial situation, he evoked “a contract with Serge Dassault for 15 million francs” or that he “had won the sum of 83,000 francs in the trifecta, but the check was lost , or that he was part of the secret service.” The judges consider these testimonies credible since their conclusion indicates that Michel Pialle was “a dangerous person for those around him, using false documents to defraud those around him”. Justice also condemns him on several occasions for “family abandonment” and “non-payment of alimony”.
His ex-companion was heard in connection with the disappearance of Karine Esquivillon. According to Le Parisien, she told the gendarmes a disturbing anecdote about the main suspect in this case: she suspects “of having been, more than 20 years ago, poisoned by Michel Pialle with his in-laws.” This meal had been worth hospitalization for the three people, but not for Michel who would not have tasted a single bite of this meal.
On BFMTV, Adélaïde Esquivillon, Karine’s sister, confided to feeling “doubts” vis-à-vis the testimonies of Michel Pialle. The first husband of the disappeared, Christophe Kedzior, denounced, on RTL, “the contradictory explanations” of the main suspect. He confides to being “so skeptical because there is no external element of his departure. No one has seen her anywhere, it’s still crazy”.
Ouest-France explains that “twenty-one investigators have been working on the case for a few weeks and the behavioral sciences department of the gendarmerie, which specializes in profiling, has been called in to monitor the custody.” Criminal profiling is an investigative technique to identify the characteristics of a suspect. This provides a psychological and behavioral picture to help investigators understand a person’s motivations.
