On the 27th of December 1937, Joseph Le Cam was shot on a corner of the Seine quays by Violette Morris. An extraordinary athlete with an impressive record – world record holder and gold medalist in shot put and javelin at the 1921 and 1922 Olympics, swimmer, cyclist, and race car driver, winner of the Bol d’Or in 1927, French football champion – she was then a national glory.
How did she transition from the sports pages to the crime pages? A free and pioneering woman, Violette Morris dressed as a man, claimed her bisexuality, and scandalized a corseted society. Her motto: “What a man can do, Violette Morris can do.”
Acquitted in 1938 for self-defense, she ventured into the music hall and aligned with the Nazi regime. An informant and denouncer to gain privileges, she was then nicknamed the “Hyena of the Gestapo.”
On the 26th of April 1944, on a road in Normandy, her car was riddled with bullets. She was 51 years old. Was it an execution on the orders of the Resistance or a case of mistaken identity? It remains a mystery to this day.
