French woman who burned grandfather alive faces life sentence

A woman found guilty of killing her bedridden grandfather by setting fire to his mattress went back on trial in France Monday, facing life behind bars after prosecutors appealed a previous sentence they deemed too lenient.

The 95-year-old victim was found dead from severe burns and smoke inhalation in his bed in August 2020.

Emilie G., 33, has admitted killing her grandfather in what she called “an act of love” to end his suffering.

A court found her guilty in October 2024 and handed her a five-year suspended sentence, but prosecutors appealed, calling the punishment insufficient for such a “cruel and selfish act”.

Now she faces a possible life sentence as appeal hearings opened on Monday in the eastern town of Bourg-en-Bresse.

During the first trial, Emilie G., who experts said suffered from depression, said she was overwhelmed by caring for her grandfather while raising her children and dealing with a faltering romantic relationship.

On the day her partner revealed he had been unfaithful, she poured gasoline on her grandfather’s mattress and threw a burning sheet of paper on the bed before fleeing the room.

Prosecutor Romain Ducrocq during the first trial argued that Emilie G. killed her grandfather to “exorcise her frustration and multiple failures”.

But the defendant said that she acted to end her grandfather’s suffering, someone she had cared for and viewed as a father figure.

She alleges her grandfather asked her to kill him several times including in the month before his death after she found him lying in his own excrement. She said she did not tell other family members.

“The bond between this granddaughter and her grandfather was extremely close,” said the defendant’s lawyer Thibaud Claus, adding there had been “no debt, no inheritance” motivating her to kill him.

“It was an act of love,” he said before the start of appeal hearings to last until Wednesday.

“She realises in hindsight that she shouldn’t have done it, and not in this way, but at the time, she didn’t have the strength to do anything else,” Claus told AFP.

Desperate situation

The young woman’s relatives have stood by her, saying she showed courage to take action.

According to a psychiatric report, she was in a “dissociative state” at the time, which was said to “impair her judgment”.

The appeal comes after France’s lower house of parliament in late May approved a right-to-die bill, which has reignited the debate around assisted dying.

If it and the upper house reach consensus on a same version of the bill, it could grant patients medical assistance to end their lives in clearly defined circumstances.

Emilie G.’s lawyer said her case was not one of advocating for assisted dying, but one in which a family had limited options.

“We are not advocating euthanasia,” Claus said.

“But it’s important to recognise that this is indeed a case of euthanasia by a family who, in a desperate situation, did what they could — though not necessarily with the right solutions.”

If approved, France would join a small group of European countries that give the right to aid in dying, including Germany, Spain, Austria and Switzerland.