Florence Crocherie is a fighter. She likes to call it out but it’s obvious when you hear her speak. His life changed on January 9 in Villemur-sur-Tarn, in the north of Toulouse. Her ex-husband, already convicted of acts of violence against her, shot her with a gun. Her knee was crushed and her leg has since been amputated. Her nursing career is on hold.
He told me “We’re going to end it once and for all”
Florence was already separated from the father of her daughter, now 5 1/2 years old, when the tragedy happened. She visited him in his mobile home in Villemur-sur-Tarn and the latter was extremely violent, says the 41-year-old mother.
“I saw him with his rifle and I said ‘what are you going to do with that again?’, and that’s when he said to me ‘we’re going to be done with it once for all'”. She’s prostrate in front of the dishwasher and that’s when a bullet lands in her knee. Her ex-husband finally calls the emergency services and turns the gun on his face, he disfigures himself.
“My knee was crushed”. – Florence Crocherie
Florence’s knee is crushed: “I was offered a prosthesis in the knee but I did not want this scrap metal, I am a nurse, I move a lot. Two days later, I had chosen amputation”.
loading
She decides to show herself
One day, at the hospital, a friend visits him. “He’s a friend who takes photos for the Miss Beauty Occitanie contest. He had already offered to take beauty photos but before, I didn’t have the time. I knew, because I’m a fighter , that I was going to walk again. I told him ‘if I do the competition, it will be for domestic violence’ and that’s what I did”.
This Saturday evening in Nègrepelisse (Tarn-et-Garonne), Florence Crocherie is participating in the Miss Beauty Occitanie contest. With her prosthesis, and high heels. “I do not hide my prosthesis. I also put myself much more often than before in a dress”, says the mother of three children. She tells her story to those who question her.
“All women must speak”
Florence Crocherie hopes to make an impression on the competition stage. She wants to encourage women victims of domestic violence to speak out. “Now you have to stop being silent. I know it’s not easy when you’re under the influence. I know that love makes you blind, as they say. But you have to say stop. You have to leave at the slightest blow. . Do you realize what this man did to me? It’s very serious.”
The mother of the family does not participate in demonstrations against gender-based violence, like this Saturday afternoon in downtown Toulouse. “It’s not the signs that are needed. We have to help women leave. Financial support is needed we must help them to settle in another department, far from their attacker”. Florence Crocherie who also believes that the sanctions are too lenient in France with regard to violent men. Her husband is currently in pre-trial detention, awaiting trial.
Leave a Comment