Sabrina Kouider and Ouissem Medouni have been found guilty at the Old Bailey this morning of murdering Sophie Lionnet.
THIS is the haunting picture of a starved French nanny taken just two days before she was murdered and burned by an evil London couple.
Sabrina Kouider and Ouissem Medouni were this morning found guilty of murdering the 21-year-old Sophie Lionnet – after subjecting her to a campaign of torture.
The pair now face life behind bars after the jury deliberated for days following a bizarre trial where the grim details leading up to her death were revealed.
The 35-year-old woman and her 40-year-old partner were convinced the young nanny was spying on the family at their Wimbledon home.
Sabrina Kouider was caught up in a bizarre fantasy where she thought the nanny was spying on her
It emerged they believed she was working with Kouider’s former boyfriend Mark Walton, a founding member of Boyzone.
Kouider convinced herself he was spying on her, having sex with the nanny and even extracting Medouni’s semen to frame him for rape.
The court heard Kouider was obsessed with her ex- she reported him to police more than 30 times and received a caution for branding him a paedophile on a fake Facebook profile.
She also accused him of sexually abusing a cat, using black magic and hiring a helicopter to spy on her.
LA-based Mr Walton said he had been “in love” with her but she would “flip” and go “crazy” for no reason.
Sophie was told she would never return home to France unless she confessed to working with Mr Walton and the couple threatened to have her arrested and jailed.
She didn’t have the money for the flight home and felt trapped – revealed in a series of notes where she repeatedly wrote “I want to go home” and “I want to leave”.
Catherine, Miss Lionnet’s mother, today said: “Sophie had only just started to live her life – no-one had the right to take it away. Sophie’s precious life was not theirs to take.
“I remember the day Sophie left, I did not want her to go and I was angry at her for leaving. Our daughter left us excited at the prospect for fulfilling her dreams.
“Sophie was from a rural area 100 kilometres from north east Paris. She lived in a small community and lived a sheltered life.
“She was kind, reserved, shy and had a small circle of friends. I did not think for a moment Sophie’s life would end so tragically.
“When police arrived at my doorstep I went into shock, I was screaming, shouting and wailing, I was taken to hospital and I have been living this nightmare ever since.
“Sophie’s sister is distraught, she simply will not accept that Sophie is dead.”
Murdered French nanny’s father tells how he is haunted by her death
Tortured and killed Sophie Lionnet’s dad, Patrick, has said he is haunted by her death.
He told the MailOnline: “I try to think of Sophie the last time I saw her – happy and smiling, but sometimes I cannot block out the horror.
“I have seen photos of her starved body – like something out of Auschwitz – that hardly resembled my precious child.
“I don’t want the image of a charred body, a recognizable human nose and fingers to be my last memory of her.”
The heartbroken dad revealed he couldn’t sleep during the trial after hearing what happened to his daughter.
Wearing a pendant with Sophie’s face on, he dubbed Kouider and Medouni as “savages” and said he wants them to stay in jail for the rest of their lives.
Her heartbroken comments come after she was forced to listen in chilling recordings how her daughter was denied hospital treatment after being tortured and the inquisitions continued until the nanny was either beaten to death or drowned in the bath of the couple’s tiny flat.
Kouider and Medouni turned on each other and blamed the other for the murder but were convicted by the Old Bailey jury of seven women and five men.
In a further twist the fashion designer – who never sold a garment – claimed Medouni had demanded to have sex as Miss Linnot’s dead body lay nearby.
Kouider collapsed in tears as the jury foreman returned the verdicts, while Medouni hung his head.
Miss Lionnet’s mother wept as Judge Nicholas Hilliard QC said he was sure the allegations against her daughter had “no truth whatsoever”.
Emotional statement from Sophie’s grieving mum on family anguish
Catherine Devallonne , Miss Lionnet’s mother, today said in court: “I did not think for a moment Sophie’s life would end so tragically.
“When police arrived at my doorstep I went into shock, I was screaming, shouting and wailing, I was taken to hospital and I have been living this nightmare ever since.
“Sophie’s sister is distraught, she simply will not accept that Sophie is dead.”
The nanny suffered a campaign of abuse at the hands of the couple she worked for
Her dad said in a statement to the court: “If only I had known what would happen to her at the hands of Sabrina and Ouissem, that she would undergo so much physical and mental torture, that her so young life was so selfishly and unnecessarily taken from her, I would never have encouraged her to leave.
“I would still have my little girl.
“She couldn’t stand seeing others suffering and it breaks my heart to know that she was abused to the end of her life.
“It was Sophie who suffered in silence, beaten and receiving wounds incompatible with life. She was imprisoned.
“Sabrina and Ouissem have not only stolen the life of my only daughter so brutally and without remorse, they have also stolen mine, my sleep, my happiness, my peace of mind and my future.”
Sophie Lionnet’s final month of horror at the hands of her murderers
Sophie Lionnet was subjected to more than a month of horrific torture as Sabrina Kouider and Ouissem Medouni tried to force her to confess to activity she wasn’t a part of.
The 21-year-old French nanny was interrogated, beaten and threatened by the delusional pair in the weeks before she was killed.
They believed the nanny had been hired by her ex to spy on her and partner in return for Hollywood acting roles.
Sophie tried to appease her employers by giving false confessions and apologies.
But she was imprisoned and starved, and forced to live, eat, and sleep at a tiny desk in cramped Wimbledon Park Road flat, writing page after page of false admissions.
The twisted couple would tell her she could go home to France but then demand more information before she could leave.
In the weeks leading up to her death in September last year, the couple beat, starved and tortured the shy 21-year-old au pair by dunking her head into water until she confessed.
In her final days, Miss Lionnet was hit with an electrical cable and beaten so badly she had five broken ribs and a cracked breast bone.
Jurors heard more than eight hours of harrowing tapes in which Miss Lionnet was slapped, likened to a Nazi collaborator and called “worse than a murderer” by her tormentors.
He described hearing Miss Lionnet screaming and splashing in the bath as they said to “breathe”.
Having killed her in the bath, the pair threw her body on a bonfire in the garden of their home near Wimbledon, south-west London, as they barbecued chicken nearby.
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