Francis Heaulme: France's 'Criminal Backpacker'
- Jun 16
- 3 min read
Updated: Jun 25
Francis Heaulme, the 'Criminal Backpacker' (le routard du crime), is one of France's most notorious serial killers — a drifter who wandered the country for years, leaving a trail of murders behind him. Convicted of around eleven killings and suspected in dozens more, his elusive, nomadic pattern made him extraordinarily difficult to catch. His case is also defined by a grave miscarriage of justice: an innocent teenager spent years in prison for a crime now linked to Heaulme. Out of respect for the victims, this account avoids graphic detail.
His story is both a portrait of a wandering predator and a cautionary tale about wrongful conviction.
Key Facts at a Glance
Full name: Francis Heaulme
Born: 25 February 1959, Metz, France
Known as: The Criminal Backpacker (le routard du crime)
Victims: Convicted of around 11 killings; suspected in many more
Background: Diagnosed with Klinefelter's syndrome
Outcome: Multiple life sentences
A damaged drifter
Born in Metz in 1959, Heaulme grew up with an abusive, alcoholic father, and his adolescence was marked by self-harm and frequent hospitalisations. After his mother — whom he adored — died of cancer in the mid-1980s, he abandoned settled life and became a vagabond, travelling erratically across France on foot, by bicycle and by train. Diagnosed with Klinefelter's syndrome and of low intelligence, he was a deeply troubled man drifting from place to place.
Murders across France
From the mid-1980s until 1992, Heaulme committed a series of brutal murders wherever his wandering took him, his victims ranging widely in age and circumstance. Because the killings were scattered across dozens of French departments and followed no obvious pattern, they were not connected for years, and the danger posed by the unassuming backpacker went unrecognised.
A wrongful conviction
One of the darkest aspects of the case involved the 1986 murder of two young boys in Montigny-lès-Metz. A teenager, Patrick Dils, was wrongly convicted of the killings and imprisoned for around fifteen years before being exonerated. Heaulme, who was in the area at the time, became a suspect in the case — a chilling example of how the failure to identify the real killer destroyed an innocent young man's life.
The investigation
Heaulme was eventually caught through the dogged work of a gendarme, Jean-François Abgrall, who painstakingly linked the wandering suspect to a series of murders through witness accounts and his movements. Abgrall's investigation, later chronicled in a book and a BBC documentary, became a celebrated example of patient detective work unravelling an elusive killer's trail.
Trials and imprisonment
Heaulme was arrested in 1992 and, over the following decades, was tried and convicted in a series of cases, accumulating life sentences. He developed a disturbing habit of doling out fragments of information to investigators, hinting at his involvement in crimes while manipulating the process. He remains in prison, with the full extent of his crimes still uncertain.
The Criminal Backpacker case is remembered both for the scattered victims Heaulme left across France and for the innocent man wrongly imprisoned in his place. It stands as a powerful reminder of how a mobile, pattern-less killer can evade detection — and of the human cost, on every side, when the real perpetrator is not found.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many people did Francis Heaulme kill?
He has been convicted of around 11 murders and is suspected in dozens more, committed across France between the mid-1980s and 1992.
Why is he called the 'Criminal Backpacker'?
He wandered across France on foot, by bicycle and by train, committing murders wherever he roamed.
Was anyone wrongly convicted for his crimes?
Yes. Patrick Dils was wrongly imprisoned as a teenager for a 1986 double murder linked to Heaulme, before being exonerated years later.
A Wandering Trail and a Wrongful Conviction
Heaulme's nomadic life made him extraordinarily difficult to track: he drifted across France for years, often committing crimes far from any fixed address, leaving investigators struggling to connect them. A determined gendarme, Jean-François Abgrall, painstakingly mapped his movements and drew out his partial confessions. The case also carried a grave injustice — in one killing later linked to Heaulme, an innocent young man had spent years wrongly imprisoned. Convicted of around eleven murders and suspected in many more, Heaulme received multiple life sentences. His case became a landmark in French criminology, illustrating both the difficulty of catching a transient killer and the terrible cost of a wrongful conviction.
Watch: Full Documentary
Sources & Further Reading
Read Also
Michel Fourniret: The 'Ogre of the Ardennes'
Manuel Blanco Romasanta: The 'Werewolf of Allariz'
Levi Bellfield: The 'Bus Stop Killer' and Britain's Double Whole-Life Prisoner
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