Overview

• The ex-anesthetist, tried in Besançon for 30 operating-room poisonings including 12 deaths, spoke at length for the first time and maintained his innocence.
• Addressing the 2017 case of Sandra Simard, he acknowledged a perfusion bag was contaminated but insisted he did not tamper with it.
• He defended administering calcium gluconate during Simard’s cardiac arrest, saying it was routine practice and not a targeted antidote to excess potassium cited by experts.
• Prosecutors allege a pattern and a motive to harm colleagues, and point to timeline elements in the Jean‑Claude Gandon case that narrowed potential injectors to Péchier and a trainee nurse.
• The court plans to question him about the Gandon case midweek; he remains free under judicial supervision and faces possible life imprisonment.