The story of Pierre Just Marny could have been told in the greatest reports on criminals and his story would have fascinated the whole world. Many questions remain on the facts, the causes and the final conditions of life of this man whom fate did not predestine for such a life.
Nevertheless, Pierre Just Marny was a criminal, considered a hero for some, as a public enemy by others and who knew how to soften up to the national level where the media took up his story to deal with the prison problem in France.
Born August 6, 1943, Pierre Just Marny was born into a very modest family in Fort de France. Indeed, following the closure of the sugar factories, many rural people then unemployed migrate to Fort de France, the capital in search of a better life, but unfortunately Martinique is in a chaotic situation in the midst of World War II.
At school, from the earliest grades, he collects dismissals and is known for his repeated absences and his difficult and provocative character. At the age of 15, he was then placed at La Tracée in Gros-Morne in a specialized educational establishment for adolescents with educational difficulties. He runs away and returns to his hometown where he will fall into petty crime.
With a bunch of friends, he specializes in the theft of auto parts. A whole network is set up with buyers who place an order with the group, which then takes care of stealing the part and delivering it in less than 24 hours. The "business", nonexistent until then in Martinique, very quickly becomes very profitable thanks to word of mouth but the stripped people have another opinion on this trade of spare parts. Following numerous complaints, the police decided to investigate this business and after a tire theft, the chopper fell on Marny!
In 1963, then 20 years old, Marny was arrested by the police. He promises his accomplices not to denounce them and to take responsibility for everyone. He was sentenced to 4 years in prison, 2 of which were suspended. After two years of penance, touched by the personality and history of the young man with a difficult past, he was offered the possibility of joining a prison-school in France. The goal was that he could be trained for a job while serving his sentence. Another favor is granted to him, to greet his parents before his transfer to France, but alas, Marny does not benefit from the leniency of the verdict.
Marny goes to find his former accomplices to claim his share of the loot. The latter refuse to accede to his request. Furious at having been duped, on September 2, 1968, armed with a rifle, Marny will enter into a murderous madness and kill three people including a 2-year-old baby, collateral victim and son of one of his alleged accomplices, and injure two others.
For 6 days, all the island's police forces are mobilized in the manhunt. The case makes the front page of the daily France-Antilles every day. Witnesses say they saw him in different towns on the island.
He was finally arrested six days later on September 8, 1965 on the route de Redoute at Fort de France. A crowd forms near the police station to see the one who had been in the spotlight for several days.
He takes the opportunity to deliver an open letter to journalists in which he explains the reasons that motivated his murderous act. He claims to have stolen spare parts for several people, agreed to go to jail and pay for everyone involved in trafficking but that they refused to give him his due once the sentence has been served.
The letter is then signed "the Black Panther" nickname he assigned.
Incarcerated in Fort de France prison, he fled on October 10, 1965, one month after his arrest. Then follows a manhunt for 9 days. It is madness in the island and the opinion of the population is changing. From bloodthirsty killer, public enemy number 1, Marny is perceived as a dangerous criminal for some who barricaded themselves in their homes, but as a hero of the people by some. The population understands Marny's thirst for revenge following his explanation in the press. His nickname of black panther is used everywhere to designate him.
He will then be protected by the population of the popular districts of Fort de France where he had grown up. These same disadvantaged neighborhoods known for their delinquency are very rarely visited by police and gendarmes. This is how Marny will spend several days protected and blend in with the young people of the Sainte-Thérèse district (district of Fort de France).
After 11 days on the run, on October 21, 1965, a prison guard said he saw Marny near a grocery store in Sainte-Thérèse.
Around 6.30 p.m., two gendarmes approach the fugitive with the order to lie down on the ground and without a weapon. Marny refuses to comply. The soldiers present as reinforcements opened fire and hit the fugitive with three bullets in the abdomen and lungs. He collapsed and was transported in very serious condition to the Clarac hospital in Fort de France.
The information of Marny's arrest (“Yo tiré anlè Marny!”, they shot Marny) quickly circulated around the island and the population revolted. The grocery store in front of which he was arrested was set on fire following suspicion of denouncing the grocer. The situation becomes deleterious between the gendarmes who are trying to restore order and the young people of the neighborhood. They are stony. For three days, the young people will face the police on the only road at the time which allowed to go to the city center. These brawls will result in 1 death and 40 wounded.
Aware of the turmoil that the case aroused locally and for fear of further excesses, it seems obvious to justice that it would not be appropriate to judge Marny on the spot. Following the operations undergone, Marny survives her gunshot wounds.
On November 24, 1965, he was transferred to Paris in the middle of the night in a military plane.
Following his trial in 1969 and after already four years of incarceration in France, he was sentenced to life imprisonment on September 27, 1969 by the Seine Assize Court. He risked the death penalty.
His conditions of detention are very harsh. Classified as a high-risk detainee, he is placed in a high-security unit in the prison and is placed in solitary confinement 23 hours a day.
In 1975, after 10 years of incarceration in France, he asked for his repatriation to Martinique but the justice refused him, judging that he could escape. He then said he was a victim of "colonial justice". Following an altercation with a prison guard, he stuns his eye, he will then be imprisoned in the Unit of Dangerous Patients, a unit for psychiatric patients of the prison of Montfavet near Avignon (Vaucluse).
He will remain in total 32 years in prison under the most extreme conditions and becomes the oldest prisoner in the history of France. Several media and personalities are stepping up to ask for approval to his request for release and his repatriation to his native land, Martinique.
On May 28, 2008, 43 years after his crimes, the administration granted his request and he was repatriated to the Ducos penitentiary in Martinique. Marny was then 65 years old and partially blind and physically weak. He will fight to demand his release with several local supporters but will only obtain a few hours of freedom to enjoy his loved ones and a swim in the Vauclin.
On August 7, 2011 after having served 48 years in prison, Pierre Just Marny was found hanged in his cell on August 7, 2011. He is by far the person who has spent the most time in detention in the history of France.
