Barry W Hughes

On September 10^th, 1977, Hamida Djandoubi was the last person to be executed by guillotine in France. Born in Tunisia around 1949, he moved to France in 1968 where following a workplace accident, he lost his job and most of his right leg. Culminating in the torture and murder of Elizabeth Bousquet, a 21 year old woman who had filed a complaint against him in 1973 for confinement and cruelty, Djandoubi had set about kidnapping several young women and attempting to force them into prostitution. The kidnappings and particularly brutal murder of Bousquet in 1974 led to charges of torture-murder, rape and premeditated violence. Djandoubi’s defence was based on the supposed effects of the amputation of his leg six years earlier leaving his lawyer to claim that Djandoubi was driven to alcohol and violence, turning him into a 'different' man. On February 25^th Djandoubi was condemned to death and on September 10^th 1977, Marcel Chevalier serving as Chief Executioner dispatched him.