GRENOBLE (AFP) - A former French soldier already imprisoned over the brutal beating death of a fellow serviceman appeared in court Monday (Jan 31) on charges of kidnapping and murdering an eight-year-old girl - a killing he has admitted was a "mistake".

Nordahl Lelandais, 38, has confessed to killing Maelys De Araujo in August 2017 after she disappeared from a wedding near the Alpine town of Chambery, eastern France, in a case that shook the country.

Police searched for months for the girl before arresting Lelandais, who was also a guest at the wedding.

He denied any involvement until investigators found traces of her blood in his car, when he finally led them to her remains in February 2018, though he has insisted her death was accidental.

"I want to offer my apologies, I did indeed cause her death but I didn't want to, I will explain during the trial," a sobbing Lelandais told the court.

He had asked permission to remove his mask and address the girl's family directly, which the presiding judge denied.

The girl's family is hoping to finally learn the truth when Lelandais takes the stand for questioning starting Wednesday, in a trial that has garnered massive media attention with some 250 reporters accredited.

"I am hoping that he will stay in prison as long as possible," the girl's father, Joachim De Araujo, told journalists as he entered the courthouse with his wife and daughter, who both carried portraits of Maelys.

Previous conviction

Lelandais, a former military dog handler, is facing up to life in prison if convicted.

He is also standing trial on charges of sexual assaulting two of his cousins in summer 2017, girls aged five and six at the time, and for recording child pornography.

The verdicts are expected to be announced around February 18.

Lelandais is already serving a 20-year prison sentence, handed down in May 2021, for the killing of Corporal Arthur Noyer in the early hours of April 12, 2017. He had picked up Noyer, 23, as he hitchhiked after leaving a nightclub in Chambery.

Lelandais also claimed that death was accidental, telling police that Noyer had struck him in a parking lot where they had stopped, prompting a fight that ended when Noyer was knocked out.

He then put Noyer's body in the boot of his car before dumping it on the side of a road.

The killings raised fears that Lelandais might have had a hand in dozens of other unsolved disappearances in the region, and prosecutors reopened several cases after reviewing his background and movements over several years.

Investigators have so far found no evidence he was involved in other crimes.