{"id":207386,"date":"2025-12-23T20:31:06","date_gmt":"2025-12-23T20:31:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/207386\/"},"modified":"2025-12-23T20:31:06","modified_gmt":"2025-12-23T20:31:06","slug":"sophie-toscan-du-plantiers-family-hopeful-dna-experts-will-lead-gardai-to-killer-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/207386\/","title":{"rendered":"Sophie Toscan du Plantier\u2019s family hopeful DNA experts will lead garda\u00ed to killer \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The family of French film producer Sophie Toscan du Plantier<\/a> say they remain hopeful a Garda cold case review will establish who killed her.<\/p>\n

On the 29th anniversary of her death, they pledged to continue to campaign for justice.<\/p>\n

Ms Toscan du Plantier, a 39-year-old mother-of-one from Paris, was found dead on the boreen leading to her isolated holiday home near Schull in west Cork on the morning of December 23rd, 1996.<\/p>\n

The killing has been the subject of an extensive Garda<\/a> investigation and, since 2022, it has been examined by a Garda serious crime review team. Its members have taken statements from 330 witnesses in Ireland, the UK<\/a>, Europe, North and South America and Australia<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The team, based in Bantry in west Cork, has been working closely with scientists at Forensic Science Ireland after recruiting American DNA collection experts M-Vac Systems to examine several exhibits gathered in the murder investigation.<\/p>\n

M-Vac chief executive Jared Bradley travelled to Dublin in July with forensic scientist Suzanna Ryan. They used the M-Vac technology to carry out examinations on various exhibits, including the rock and concrete block used to kill Ms Toscan du Plantier.<\/p>\n

Five months on from that examination, Ms Toscan du Plantier\u2019s family awaits news from the crime review team. Her uncle, Jean Pierre Gazeau, said the family remains hopeful the new examination could yield results.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis will be the first anniversary of Sophie\u2019s death since her father Georges died, so it will be especially sad. But Sophie\u2019s mother Marguerite will be surrounded by her family in Paris \u2013 her sons, Bertrand and Stephane and her grandson, Sophie\u2019s son, Pierre Louis,\u201d said Mr Gazeau.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe still hope for some result from the cold case team because the Garda are still waiting [for] the results of the technical element of the investigation, but we still hope too that there will be some developments with witnesses because the Garda have rediscovered so many statements.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t know what exactly happened to Sophie between 10.30pm on December 22nd and 10.30am on December 23rd. We want to know the truth of her murder. <\/p>\n

\u201cI personally still hope because I cannot do anything else,\u201d he said, adding that the family created a campaign group, the Association for the Truth about the Murder of Sophie Toscan du Plantier, in 2008.<\/p>\n

Sources close to the Garda review team say it will be 2026 before they receive the results of the DNA tests.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe cold case team are happy to wait and allow FSI do their work as they know it may be the last throw of the dice,\u201d a source said. \u201cThe forensics is the one piece of the case that has been missing for 29 years. Nobody has been put at the scene forensically.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The family of French film producer Sophie Toscan du Plantier say they remain hopeful a Garda cold case…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":207387,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,618,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-207386","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-sophie-toscan-du-plantier","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207386","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=207386"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207386\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/207387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=207386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=207386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=207386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}