“The French are glad to die for love…” So sang Marilyn Monroe in
“Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend.” The Swiss, however, are less
cheerful about dead Frenchmen. On June 18, a Swiss jury sentenced
Cécile Brossard to eight and a half years in prison for the
2005 murder of her kinky lover, Edouard Stern, during a BDSM
scene.

Stern, a banker, was one of France’s richest citizens. Brossard
admitted shooting him while he was tied to a chair, dressed in a
head-to-toe latex suit, wearing a dildo and a mask. But she said
Stern had tricked her into thinking that he’d given her a million
dollars, that he loved her, and that he wanted to marry her. Then he
took back the money and, during the scene, taunted her viciously,
calling her a whore. She “snapped,” got the gun, and shot him multiple
times.

Stern’s scandalous death shocked the region’s conservative
investment industry. Prosecutor Daniel Zappelli pushed for a stiffer
penalty, saying Brossard “showed cruelty” by not removing the latex
suit from Stern’s body after she shot him. Leaving him to be found in
it ruined his reputation. (Obviously, Mr. Zappelli has no experience
with latex bodysuits. Getting into one, alive, is laborious.
Getting a dead body out of one sounds horrible.) However, it’s
widely speculated the relatively brief sentence reflects the Swiss
government’s wish to sweep the embarrassing incident under the
rug.

It’s an extreme example of how roles in BDSM relationships aren’t
always what they seem. I don’t condone murder, and I certainly won’t be
sending Brossard any invitations to come play in my dungeon when she’s
released. But descriptions of Stern do not create much sympathy,
either. He doesn’t seem like a nice, well-liked guy. Certainly he
wasn’t noted for kindness or fairness—he once forced his own
father out of a family firm. And the judge in the case remarked on
Stern’s “humiliating, harassing, and occasionally cruel” behavior toward Brossard. Just because Stern wanted Brossard to play
the Mistress in the bedroom doesn’t mean he wasn’t a controlling,
abusive prick to her.

A murder like this one isn’t spawned in an instant. Any
relationship, kinky or vanilla, can turn nasty. News stories called
this a “sex-games slaying.” But these two people had gone way
past games. Stern didn’t deserve to be murdered just for being an
asshole. I believe Brossard didn’t plan to kill him. But for good or
for bad, doing BDSM often brings out strong emotions in people. The
fact that Stern let Brossard start a scene with him, render him
helpless and immobile, and then began insulting her about real-life,
high-stakes disputes speaks volumes to me. A toxic BDSM relationship
between two damaged people has the potential to spin desire, rage,
sex, and violence into a tornado just looking for a place to touch
down. If it does, the result will not be anything that looks like
love. recommended

6 replies on “Control Tower”

  3. I dont get this thing about the mainstream @3… the murder has nothing to do with the BDSM scene. it just happened during one, but it could as well have happened at breakfast… he might have run, but still. I think people give too much importance to the fact that they were in a BDSM scene. anyway, nice article.

  6. I’m fairly shocked by this article. You seem to want to attenuate the horror of such a crime by describing the victim as “an asshole” and talking about the strong feelings spawned by BDSM. I get the impression you are being as partial and prejudicial about this crime as most of the mainstream media, it is just that you are being partial towards the opposite side as the media.
    First of all you are basing your judgement of the victim heavily on the statements about him made by the murderer in her defence. This is hardly a trustworthy source.
    But above all, how much of a nice guy or how much of a asshole he might have been is absolutely irrelevant in this case. She murdered someone in cold blood while the person presented no physical threat to her whatsoever and that is all there is to it.

Comments are closed.