An obsessive French father accused of drugging his children's tennis rivals, and unintentionally killing one of them, was jailed for eight years on Thursday. Christophe Fauviau, 46, was found guilty of manslaughter. One of the players whose drink he had spiked died after losing control of his car on the way home from a match.
Fauviau had faced a potential 20 years in jail for "premeditated administration of a harmful substance that caused death without intention." But the advocate general, Serge Mackowiak, called for a lighter sentence of between eight and 10 years. He accepted that Fauviau had not sought to kill or injure the players.
However, the prosecutor described the defendant as "an adult who turned his children into objects of his own fantasies of success" and whose actions were premeditated.
PHOTO: AFP
"Nothing stopped you: players collapsing on the court, the sight of stretchers, of an 11-year-old girl, a young woman, who collapses against a fence," said Mackowiak. "It's normal to want your children to succeed, but there are limits. For you, the ends justified the means."
Fauviau's wife, Catherine, 43, told the court that neither she nor the children had any idea that players were being drugged. She said her husband was a good father but had "cracked" over the tennis.
In the end, she would accompany their son, Maxime, and daughter, Valentine, to matches because he could no longer "bear to see his children play."
She said her husband's problems were linked to conflicts with the tennis league over Valentine's training. At the time, the teenager was one of France's best players in her age group.
"The whole affair has been a very big shock for us," said Catherine Fauviau. "It's terrible what he did -- incomprehensible. I can assure you he's a good person."
Valentine Fauviau said she wanted to continue playing tennis to show that she did not need her father's help to win.
"Perhaps he did it for love," she told the court. "My father never wanted to hurt anyone."
Fauviau, a former army helicopter pilot, admitted doping a number of players, but had told the court that he had become obsessed with tennis and was mentally disturbed at the time.
The court, at Mont-de-Marsan, south-west France, was told that Fauviau had devoted himself to the tennis careers of his teenage children. But it became more than just a game. He took to drugging their rivals with a sedative that he slipped into their water bottles.
The tactic went tragically wrong when Alexandre Lagardere, 25, a teacher, pulled out of a match with Maxime in July 2003 after the first set, complaining that he felt too tired and ill to continue.
While driving home, his car left the road and he was killed. An autopsy revealed traces of the powerful sedative, Temesta.
Fauviau was arrested as he returned from a tennis tournament in Egypt with his daughter. Police said he admitted drugging Lagardere and two other players. But many other players then complained that they had felt ill during and after matches with the Fauviau children -- suffering fatigue, blurred vision and stomach pains.
Investigators say that between 2000 and 2003 -- without the knowledge of his children or wife -- Fauviau spiked the drinks of six boys and 21 girls, of whom nine were minors.
The retired serviceman admitted drugging the players. He said he was unable to bear watching them compete.
"At that time I wasn't well at all," he told the court. "Putting tablets into someone's bottles -- I can't explain it."
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