Sabrina Kouider and Ouissem Medouni had accused Sophie Lionnet of being in league with Mark Walton
A couple, who killed their timid French nanny and threw her body on a bonfire because of their warped fantasy about an ex-Boyzone pop star, have been convicted of murder.
Sabrina Kouider, 35, and Ouissem Medouni , 40, beat, starved and tortured au pair Sophie Lionnet, 21, after falsely accusing her of being in league with music mogul Mark Walton, who was Kouider’s ex-boyfriend.
The couple killed her in the bath then burned her body in their garden near Wimbledon, south west London, as they barbecued chicken nearby. When neighbours alerted fire fighters, Medouni tried to pass off the charred remains as a sheep.
Kouider collapsed in tears and Medouni hung his head as the jury foreman returned guilty verdicts to murder for both. They each blamed the other for Lionnet’s death.
The two-month Old Bailey trial, which was described as stranger than fiction, heard how fashion designer Kouider was fixated with Walton and believed Lionnet was colluding with him to drug and molest the family.
The couple’s “unhealthy, myopic, all-consuming and groundless” obsession with with the former boy band singer, had deprived them of reason and turned their nanny into “something less than human” prosecutor Richard Horwell QC, had told jurors.
Boyzone founder: I 'never ever' knew murdered French nanny Read more
They tortured her by dunking her head under water into making an untrue “confession” which they filmed before killing her.
Lionnet’s mother, Catherine Devallonne, wept as judge Nicholas Hilliard QC said claims the couple made against Lionnet had “no truth whatsoever”. The jury heard she had never even met Walton, who left the UK in 2015.
But Kouider, a mother of two, was convinced her ex-boyfriend was colluding with her nanny and swept Medouni up into the fantasy.
She had waged a five year war on Dublin-born Walton following their split, reporting him to police more than 30 times, with outlandish claims of black magic and sexual abuse of a cat, falsely accusing him on Facebook of being a paedophile, and claiming he had hired a helicopter to spy on her.
Walton had shouldered the ludicrous slurs and responded with “integrity and honesty”, the prosecution said, willingly travelling from LA to give evidence.
The murder bore the hallmarks of a psychosis known as “folie a deux” – or a “madness of two” – which is defined as a delusion shared from one individual to another, with Kouider the driving force and Medouni the willing party.
Kouider created a fantasy world casting Walton as an evil villain who seduced Lionnet with sex and promises of Hollywood stardom. Medouni, a former banker, became an ardent believer of Kouider’s twisted reality, the jury heard.
Born in Algeria , Kouider grew up in Paris, where aged 18, she met Medouni, a fellow French Algerian five years her senior, at a fun fair. Their on-off relationship, which lasted 17 years ending in the Old Bailey dock, was dysfunctional and turbulent, and marred by Kouider’s irrational jealousy and violence.
When Kouider went to work as a nanny in London, Medouni followed, working as a financial analyst for French bank Societe Generale in London until redundancy in 2012. He had “punched above his weight” in his love for her, according to the prosecution. The balding 40-year-old, known as Sam, was weak and submissive. When she went off with other men, he waited in the wings for her to return.
Kouider was involved in pyramid selling for a telecommunications company when she met Walton in a bank in Notting Hill, London in 2011. Walton, who now lives in Los Angeles, fell head over heels in love, he told the court, but once the “love goggles” wore off, found her to be calculating, manipulative and likely to flip and go “crazy” in a moment.
After they split, she went back to Medouni.
The trial heard she had depression and borderline personality disorder. One ex-boyfriend, Anthony Francois, described her as “fickle” and a “lunatic” who would lie, manipulate and target the weak. She could lash out at complete strangers, grabbing women’s hair just for looking at her, he said .
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Sophie Lionnet. Photograph: Metropolitan Police/PA
Lionnet, 21, who was pretty, shy and an “ingenue” was “ripe for exploitation” by her violent and oppressive employers, the prosecutor said. Born in Troyes, northern France, she at first seemed “happy” in her first job, but before her death, seemed “fed up” and wanted to go back to her family in France.
She was beaten, interrogated and accused of stealing a diamond pendant. Kousider hit her with an electrical cord, and either she or Medouni broke five ribs and her breastbone as the violence escalated last September. She was in such a state, the defendants refused to allow her out of their two-bedroom flat for the last 12 days of her life.
A video made hours before her death showed her emaciated, broken and terrified. She suffered a broken jaw. The exact cause of death could not be established. The prosecution said she died in the bath following water torture involving both Kouider and Medouni, though neither admitted being responsible for her injuries.
When her curled up remains were uncovered in a bonfire, firefighters thought it was the body of a child because she was so small and frail.
She had been murdered out of “revenge and punishment” over a man whom she had never even met.
Aisling Hosein, from the Crown Prosecution Service said while “only Kouider and Medouni know exactly how they killed Sophie”, they were “both jointly involved and came up with a plan to try and destroy her body and escape responsibility for this horrendous crime”.
Lionnet’s devastated mother Catherine Devallone condemned the couple as “monsters”. “No god will ever forgive you”, she said in an emotional statement, read by a police officer to the court. “You are equally as evil as one another”.
Her father, Patrick Lionnet, said the two had not only stolen the life of his daughter “so brutally and without remorse,” but had also stolen his “sleep, my happiness, my peace of mind and my future”.
The pair are expected to be sentenced at the Old Bailey on 26 June.
Irish-born music mogul Mark Walton suffered the indignity of being wrongly accused of a host of heinous crimes.
He is a millionaire songwriter, who has worked with the likes of Jennifer Lopez, Shaggy and Enrique Iglesias and when Walton first saw Sabrina Kouider, it was like the lyrics to a song - love at first sight.
He'd spotted her in 2011 at a bank in Notting Hill. He told jurors: "I was in love. She was my life then "
He launched his successful music career in 1993 when he founded Boyzone with a group of friends. He was with the group for a year before he set up another band called, Fifth Avenue. He is now a judge on Vietnam's Pop Idol show.
He and Sabrina lived together for two years in Queensway, London, before she disappeared without warning.
Mr Walton told the court their relationshop was turbulent, "probably the most turbulent relationship he'd ever been in".
Because he lives in Los Angeles, Mr Walton could not be compelled to give evidence but willingly agreed to bare his soul in front of a packed Old Bailey courtroom.
Sabrina Kouider had accused Walton of conspiring with nanny Sophie Lionnet to drug and molest her family. She also branded him a cat abuser and a paedophile.
She even claimed he had hired a helicopter to hover above her south-west London flat to spy on her.
Softly spoken Mr Walton who is 40 was forced to respond to the slurs in court even though he had never met or heard of Sophie before the trial and had not been in the UK since 2015.
It emerged during the trial that he was generous financially to Kouider even after their relationship ended. In 2013, he paid £12,800 in rent on Kouider's Southfields flat but stopped the financial support in February 2014.
In retaliation, Kouider rang his mother in Dublin, contacted his business partners and created a fake Facebook page on which she called him a paedophile.
In his closing speech, the prosecutor altered a well known quote when he described Walton as a wealthy man - and said " it is of course a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune will often be parted from it."
It was perhaps his generosity towards Kouider seems to have tipped her over the edge. When the hand-outs stopped the vicious vendetta against him started.
MARK Walton is one of the founding members of Boyzone who later went on to forge a successful career as a music mogul.
He hit the headlines recently after his ex-partner was found guilty of murder when a badly burned body was found in the garden of a London home. But what do we know about him?
Enterprise News and Pictures Mark Walton is an Irish music mogul
Who is Mark Walton?
Mark, who is from Donaghmede in Dublin, Ireland, put Boyzone together while he was in school with Shane Lynch.
He then recruited manager Louis Walsh for help in taking over the charts.
But about a year after they made their name through their infamous Late Late Show debut, Mark was edged out of the band he created.
Of his oust from the band, he said: "I was the lead singer. The boys felt it was my band and there were articles written about this 15-year-old boy who had put this band together."
After Boyzone, Mark set up a band called 5th Avenue, and he also got involved with B*Witched
He has since gone on to become an internationally successful music mogul and a judge on Vietnam’s Pop Idol.
He works with top artists like Jennifer Lopez, Shaggy and Enrique Iglesias.
In 2016, he claimed to be a billionaire.
He said: “I never planned to be in a position where I could be a billionaire from Ireland.
“Right now, I have the crazy glamour, big-name side to what I’m doing in my career that I think no one expected of me.
“And I intend to do a lot more with it than buy Lamborghinis and spend my time on the beach.”
Facebook Sabrina Quider killed nanny Sophie Lionnet
Who is Mark's ex-girlfriend Sabrina Kouider?
Jurors heard how Sabrina Kouider was the ex-girlfriend of Boyzone founder member Mark Walton.
Their relationship was turbulent and she even accused Walton of sexually abusing her cat - even though she did not have one, the jury heard.
Sabrina, 34, is said to have worked as a stylist, make-up artist, fashion designer and songwriter.
Mark's ex-girlfriend and her new partner, Ouissem Medouni, were charged with murder in September 2017.
Prosecutors said she murdered "naive and vulnerable" Sophie Lionnet, 21, and then burned her body in her garden.
Sabrina pleaded guilty to burning the remains of French au-pair Sophie Lionnet at an address in Southfields in London.
Lionnet's charred remains were found in the back garden of Kouider’s £900,000 property.
Neighbours had complained of a strange smell and a schoolboy said he had seen a man making what appeared to be a bonfire.
She harboured "outlandish" delusions about ex Walton and Sophie, the jury heard.
Kouider even claimed Mr Walton had drugged and sexually abused her family and said Sophie had colluded with him, even though they'd never met.
The Old Bailey were told Lionnet and Medouni kept the French nanny “prisoner” in their own home – where she lived a "truly wretched” life.
It was alleged Sabrina and Ouissem would levy "outlandish" and "malevolent" allegations against the young nanny to intimidate and control her.
They beat her to death before burning her body in the garden.
Sophie's body was so badly burnt police were unable to identify her at first.
The couple have been found guilty of murder and burning her body.
Ms Kouider, of French Algerian descent, is understood to be estranged from her French husband.
She dreamed of becoming an actress and had moved to Britain “to perfect her English and see another part of the world”, the trial heard.
Originally from Troyes, in north-eastern France, she had been in the UK for 14 months.
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What has Mark Walton said about ex Sabrina Kouider?
Walton described his ex as "manipulative", telling the court "abusive" Koudier had "exhibited a manipulative and controlling nature" with a "calculating streak".
He flew from Los Angeles to give evidence at the Old Bailey trial.
He told jurors: "Sabrina shared some stories from her past. I guess knowing that, I felt it brought us closer together at times, but it was turbulent, probably the most turbulent relationship I had ever been in.
"She would go from softly spoken French accent then she would flip, get very angry, very loud and just not care where we were.
"She would just go crazy over something trivial."
Sabrina Kouider waged a five-year war on a wealthy music mogul, reporting him to police more than 30 times with outlandish claims of black magic and sexual abuse of a cat.
The trial heard how ex-Boyzone star Mark Walton paid Kouider tens of thousands of pounds after they split up but that she resumed her hate campaign after the payments dried up.
Kouider, 35, falsely accused Mr Walton on Facebook of being a paedophile and a month before Sophie Lionnet’s death took her to Lavender Hill police station and accused her of plotting with Mr Walton. The timid 21-year-old told officers the allegations were untrue.
Police records showed Kouider contacted them dozens of times between 2012 and 2017. On July 16 2012, she reported a “crazy argument” with Mr Walton, accusing him of cheating. Days later, they were back together but on October 30, after they split up, she claimed he had been violent three times during their relationship.
On December 6, Kouider complained about 60 voicemails from Mr Walton, although none contained threats. In March 2014, she claimed she had been “hacked” by Mr Walton but “nasty” emails turned out to contain apologies and expressions of love.
On April 28, Kouider was found “very agitated, kicking and screaming” outside her home in Wimbledon Park Road.
She claimed Mr Walton had been “using black magic to control her and there was nothing she could do about it”. Between May and June 2014, Kouider repeatedly complained to police that they were not taking her allegations seriously. On July 4, 2014, she told police he had hacked her Facebook account and breached a non-molestation order.
In interview, Mr Walton said he had supported her financially until three months earlier. He said that after they broke up, she asked him every three months for money, which he gave her. He paid £15,000 for a deposit for a house and gave her £20,000 eight months earlier. Police dropped the inquiry.
The complaints continued and police noted that Kouider struggled to accept that Mr Walton had no case to answer. On September 19, 2015, she set up a fake Facebook account on which she called Mr Walton a “paedophile” and for which she received a caution. On March 14, 2016, Kouider accused Mr Walton of sexually abusing a cat and bribing social services to make trouble for her.
On August 10, 2017, she took Miss Lionnet to Lavender Hill police station, claiming she had met Mr Walton, who had threatened to shoot the family.
In a private conversation with an officer, Miss Lionnet confided that “none of it was true, she had not seen any male and no threats were made”.
The next month, Miss Lionnet died after being tortured into confessing to being in league with Mr Walton. Investigations failed to find a shred of evidence that the couple’s warped fears, but they refused to accept that Mr Walton and Miss Lionnet had never met.
