Who killed our beautiful mum? Hunt for Karen Carter's murderer goes on
Inside the café, a photograph now hangs at the wood-panelled bar. Karen Carter, 65, volunteered there at the café before she was stabbed to death at her home nearby two months ago. Her killer is still at large, and the photo of the smiling Carter is the only hint that the café, festooned with lights and bunting, and the village, remain a focus of the murder hunt.
Investigators have a working theory: that the killer harboured a personal grudge against Carter, a married mother with four adult children, or a problem with the relationship she had struck up with Jean-Francois Guerrier, with whom she helped to run the bar at Café Village.
He and another volunteer, Marie-Laure Autefort, who made public her infatuation with Guerrier, were both arrested and released without charge. Today, as Trémolat moves uneasily towards its peak tourist season, Carter's adult children have spoken for the first time about their mother's murder, which police said was 'planned and exceptionally violent'.
Guerrier, 74, found Carter dying from multiple stab wounds in her driveway at 10pm on April 29, after she had left his farmhouse on the edge of Trémolat where he had hosted a wine-tasting event. He had followed her at a discreet distance to spend the night at her converted barn. Guerrier tried to revive her as he called the emergency services, but she was beyond help.
'I keep thinking about what her last moments would have been like,' said Liz Carter, 29, an engineering student in the United States. 'The colour in my life has washed away'. She learnt of the death after a call from her father, Alan. From South Africa, he had to break the news to all four children — two daughters and two sons — scattered between Britain, the US and Australia. The family later reunited in Trémolat, where they had spent many holidays, to visit their property, which is now a crime scene, and hold a funeral.
The prosecutor's confirmation that his wife's affair was the investigation's focus, Alan Carter said, compounded the shock with a sense of betrayal. The couple, married for 30 years and dual British and South African citizens, had spent years renovating Les Chouettes, an old cottage and barn that Karen ran as gîtes. The couple had disagreed about how to divide their time, with Karen keen to live in France permanently.
Katy Carter, 30, who lives in Britain, said her mother had been 'so excited about her life in France and growing old in Trémolat'. After spending most of her life in South Africa worrying about crime, Karen Carter often spent months alone in Trémolat, leaving doors unlocked, her family said.
Her murder was the most violent crime anyone can remember in the Périgord region. It is believed her killer lay in wait and lunged from the shadows as she got out of her car, stabbing her eight times from the front. The first blow, to the heart, was fatal, according to the post-mortem examination. Liz Carter imagines the killer 'was a deeply disturbed individual who had nothing going for them. They saw my mother's beautiful life and, for whatever reason, chose to extinguish her light'.
Widespread coverage of the murder has concerned Éric Chassagne, Trémolat's mayor for 30 years. He feared it would put visitors off and keep the locals at home. Instead, the village is buzzing, even if the unsolved murder is 'causing suspicion to weigh on the village', with concerns that the killer is likely to be in their midst.
More than 200 people are thought to have made statements to police, and multiple searches have been made in the fields and woods surrounding the Carter property for clues and the murder weapon. 'The most probable [lines of inquiry] involve people we know. It's the most obvious,' the mayor said.
Chassagne was one of the last people to see Carter alive at the small gathering at Guerrier's home, to taste new wines that he and Carter had chosen to stock Café Village. The venue was set up in a vacant village shop at the end of the pandemic as an attempt to bring a social focus to Tremolat's jumble of old blue-collar families, such as Autefort's, the retired city professionals, including Guerrier, and expat holiday-home owners with their limited French.
Organisers announced its 'indefinite' closure after the murder, and its revival feels too soon for some regulars who feel the merriment beneath Carter's portrait is disrespectful and premature, while her murder remains unsolved. The mayor, however, believes life should not be paused. 'I was in complete agreement with the reopening. It had to reopen eventually … Trémolat must get on with life and carry on welcoming people from everywhere,' Chassagne said.
Guerrier, originally from Paris and who spent some years in England as an IT executive, has kept a low profile. Autefort, a 69-year-old retired carer, has not been seen in the village since her release after two days of police questioning.
Her brother Philippe Monribot, who was a fireman for 42 years, was questioned by investigators for four hours last week, he told The Times. He has lived in Trémolat his whole life and said he had been asked by the gendarmes to show them spots where the killer might have dumped their weapon in the woods which surround the properties belonging to the Carters, him and his sister.
'They're wasting their time,' said Monribot, who is convinced the murder was a professional hit, though he understood why his sister, Autefort, fell under suspicion. She had been in love with Guerrier, whom she called 'the tall one', Monribot said, adding that Guerrier had once demanded she divorce her husband to be free, but then spurned her.
A police source said they did not consider the crime to be a contract killing.
Nick Sachs, Carter's son from her first marriage, who lives in London, said the family all struggled to imagine the future without her. 'It's a hole in our lives that we can't fill.'
His brother, Jonathan, who works in construction in Australia, said he had felt 'aimless' since his mother's death and was prepared that the killer might never be caught.
'I've come to realise that there is a possibility that the culprit may never be identified and we as a family will need to learn and accept that,' he said.
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Times
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Forged in the gulag, Belarus's real first couple is reunited
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Calais police pose for a selfie after they slash people smugglers' dinghy... before letting the gang saunter away
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3 hours ago
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We should consider introducing same prison sentence as France on hiring illegal workers here… and bring back Rwanda
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