Emile Louis, one of the most notorious serial killers in French history, has died at the age of 79.
Louis, who was convicted in 2004 of killing seven mentally impaired young women, died on Sunday morning in a secure hospital in Nancy in eastern France, his lawyer Alain Fraitag told AFP.
As well as the seven murders, Louis was also convicted of raping and torturing his second wife and the sexual assault of her daughter.
Five of the women Louis killed used a bus he drove for social services in the Yonne district of northern Burgundy, from where the seven young women disappeared between 1975 and 1979.
He had a relationship with one of the victims and another one had been placed in the care of his family.
