A BELGIAN judge has sent a young schoolteacher to prison for 30 years after a jury convicted her of murdering her skydiving partner and love rival by cutting the cords of her parachute.
The sentencing of El Clottemans (26) brings to a close a macabre case that began in November 2006 when her friend Els Van Doren (38) plunged 4,000m to her death in a suburban garden. The two women and their mutual lover, Marcel Somers, had jumped together from an aircraft to make a mid-air formation, something they had done together on numerous previous occasions.
There was no firm evidence to directly link Clottemans, also known as Babs, to the killing, leading to warnings from her legal team that a conviction risked a miscarriage of justice. However, the jury found the circumstantial evidence was strong enough to show Clottemans deliberately killed Ms Van Doren, and that the act was premeditated.
Ms Van Doren’s main and reserve chutes failed as she fell to the ground, with her death having been recorded on a small video-camera attached to her helmet. A married mother of two, she spent most Saturday nights with Mr Somers, a skydiving instructor. Her husband testified that he knew nothing of their liaison, which went on for years.
At the same time Mr Somers was conducting a relationship with Clottemans, and spent most Friday nights with her. Prosecutors alleged she was consumed with jealousy as she was second to her rival in Mr Somers’s affections. Lawyers for Ms Van Doren’s family also alleged Clottemans stole her make-up kit after the killing to keep as a trophy.
Seeking the maximum 30-year sentence yesterday, prosecutor Patrick Boyen said Ms Van Doren saw her death coming from high in the air, as if Clottemans had pushed her off Mont Blanc. Noting that Clottemans was guilty of sabotaging Ms Van Doren’s parachute almost a week before her death, Mr Boyen said she had 10,297 minutes to prevent the tragedy, even anonymously.
Clottemans listened with an apparent sense of resignation as the judge handed down the sentence, and looked tearful, pale and tired as she was led away from court. She always insisted on her innocence, doing so again as the jury’s deliberations began on Wednesday. At that point she declared that she had seen hell since becoming the sole suspect within weeks of the killing.
She then turned to Ms Van Doren’s two children to say she too had experienced the pain of losing her father, who died when she was two. The teenagers broke down in tears and left the courtroom.