Dramatic twist in the Jubillar affair. In a letter revealed this Monday, July 6, Cédric Jubillar acknowledges his responsibility in the disappearance of his wife Delphine. The one who was sentenced last October to 30 years in prison looks back on this famous night of December 15, 2020, where he committed the irreparable. He explains in particular how an argument between him and Delphine “degenerated”.
But these confessions raise the question: why recognize the facts after several years? Is this an admission that would respond to a final strategy or does Cédric Jubillar hope to influence the procedure? For Amélie Boukhobza, psychologist and author of the podcast “You told me…”, a confession never responds to a single logic. It can respond to several motivations, even contradictory ones.
A confession does not always mean that one is only trying to tell the truth
When a person recognizes facts, the first instinct is to see a form of rediscovered sincerity.
“However, it is difficult to know what the real intentions of a person who confesses are. Only they can really know them…” confirms Amélie Boukhobza.
The specialist therefore urges caution. Behind the same statement, very different emotions can coexist: guilt, psychological fatigue, the need to be heard or the desire to regain control.
“From a psychological point of view, a confession does not always have the sole function of telling the truth” confirms the expert, who admits to having produced an episode on this subject.
In other words: motivations can be multiple (and not just moral) and evolve over time.
Talking can be a way to regain control of your story
When a case has been in the media for years – as is the case for Cédric Jubillar – the person involved often loses control of their image. Testimonies accumulate, hypotheses circulate and everyone constructs their own story. In this context, a confession can also become a way of regaining control – and speech.
“A confession can be used to regain control of a story that has escaped your attention. To once again become the author of your own story. This is all the more true when an affair is widely publicized and others tell the story for you” confides the practitioner.
But this desire for control can also coexist with other motivations. “It can also have a strategic dimension. Influence a procedure, negotiate, obtain a benefit, change the way you view yourself or even control the way in which the facts will be retained” recognizes the specialist.
This is also what leads Amélie Boukhobza to question this news. “I also wondered if all this was not strategic – although that remains one hypothesis among others, obviously.”
“Some people can no longer bear to carry a secret alone”
Another possibility: Cédric Jubillar spoke… to ease his conscience after years of silence.
“At a given moment, the psychological weight can become too great. Some people can no longer bear to carry a secret alone, whatever the consequences” indicates the expert.
But this guilt, this urgent need to confide can once again be combined with other motivations.
“It is important to keep in mind: any confession can combine guilt, the need to regain control, strategic calculation and psychological relief,” concludes Amélie Boukhobza.
This is undoubtedly all of this which makes confessions so difficult to interpret: they do not, on their own, allow us to understand a person’s intentions. Only justice can establish facts. Psychologists simply point out that a confession never tells a single story…