Georges-Alexandre Sarret

Timeline

• April 10, 1934 — Georges-Alexandre Sarret was executed by guillotine at Aix-en-Provence.

Background

Georges Alexander Sarrejani, alias Sarret, was a Trieste-born Greek who succeeded Henri Desire Landru as France's most spectacular murderer. Sarret prepared carefully for his chosen profession of insurance murderer by studying medicine, chemistry and law at Marseilles, and he needed confederates.

Sarret found confederates in the persons of the Bavarian sisters Philomena and Catherine Schmidt. The Schmidt sisters were unofficially accused as German agents during the War. Sarret methodically found the Schmidt sisters elderly, invalid husbands and insured them. The husbands promptly died and Sarret pocketed most of the insurance money on threat of turning the Schmidt sisters over to the police as poisoners and War spies. From then on the business prospered as “Sarret. Schmidt & Cie.”

The offence

Sarret, Schmidt & Cie. rented various small villas as “nursing homes.”

Detectives found a great mass of bones under a boulder in the garden of Sarret's house in Marseilles, consisting of rat bones, cat bones, assorted dog bones up to the skeleton of a St. Bernard, all more or less decomposed by acid.

After some events at M. Poncel's villa near Marseilles, French detectives recalled Sarret's garden and its pile of acid-eaten animal bones.

A case involved M. Poncel returning from a vacation in Italy to his villa near Marseilles and finding the dining room floor ruined by strange stains, a heap of acid-eaten rags near the garden hedge, and “a horrid stinking mess in a corner of the garden.”

Sarret rented M. Poncel's villa L'Hermitage and got into difficulties with another underling: an unfrocked priest named Louis Chambon and the latter's mistress, a Mile Ballandreaux. When M. Poncel returned and found the horrid mess in his garden and the stains on the floor, French detectives remembered Sarret's garden and its pile of acid-eaten animal bones.

Catherine Schmidt confessed after she was questioned for hours. Louis Chambon, the unfrocked priest, had threatened to peach on Georges Sarret. Chambon was lured with his mistress to the house, and while Catherine Schmidt kept a motorcycle engine roaring in the cypress shaded courtyard to drown all noise, Georges Sarret shot priest & mistress from behind a screen.

Sarret and the victims drove into Marseilles where Murderer Sarret purchased a bathtub, then sent the terrified Schmidt sisters back to wander for three nights about the house with its two reeking corpses. On the fourth day Sarret returned with 26 gallons of sulphuric acid in the back of his car. The bodies were crushed in the bubbling vat until even the bones and teeth had dissolved, and then the thick sludge that had once been Louis Chambon & friend was dumped by pailfulls in the garden.

The next morning Sarret poked about with a stick and carefully picked out a few gold fillings, one gold crown, six flattened bullets.

Sarret, Schmidt & Cie. made its first mistake when healthy Catherine Schmidt insured herself for a million francs as Mageli Herbin, and the real Mageli Herbin promptly died of pneumonia. Insurance companies became suspicious. Detectives investigated and found a series of mysterious facts but no direct evidence of crime.

Investigation

Investigators questioned the Schmidt sisters for hours.

Under a boulder in the garden of Sarret's house in Marseilles, detectives found a great mass of bones—rat bones, cat bones, assorted dog bones up to the skeleton of a St. Bernard—all more or less decomposed by acid.

The events at M. Poncel's villa led investigators to remember Sarret's garden and its pile of acid-eaten animal bones.

Arrest

The prompt provided does not include specific facts about an arrest.

Trial

Thanks to Georges Sarret's legal knowledge, the trial dragged on month after month.

Finally last October, Georges Sarret was condemned to death, and the Schmidt sisters were sentenced to ten years at hard labor.

Sentencing

Georges Sarret was condemned to death. The Schmidt sisters were condemned to ten years at hard labor.

Outcome

Last week, he went to meet Mme Guillotine before the Town Hall of Aix-en-Provence. Strapped quickly to the board, he was pushed beneath the knife.

The end of drama was not yet. The executioner tripped the lever, the triangular blade crashed down—and jammed, half way down. “Imbeciles!” bellowed Murderer Sarret. “Be quick can't you!”

For ten minutes he lay with his head on the block while perspiring, embarrassed workmen argued and tinkered. Executioner Deibler clutched at his weak heart. Then up went the knife to crash down again, successfully this time.

Guillotine and crowds were gone and the square hosed and washed before breakfast.

Seventy-six-year-old M. Deibler had officiated at exactly 300 executions. He had long talked of retiring to the country and wanted to raise chickens.

Aftermath

The square had been hosed and washed before breakfast after the execution.