A former police officer confessed to being a notorious serial killer and rapist whose crimes have haunted Parisian detectives for decades, according to local reports.
French cop Francois Verove, 59, left a suicide note in which he fessed up a series of murders and rapes that have gone unsolved since the 1980s.
Per Sky News, Verove was said to have been found in a rental flat in the South of France days after he was summoned for DNA testing in connection with murders linked to a man known as 'Le Grele'.
DNA has now confirmed he is the serial killer nicknamed 'Le Grele' - 'the pockmarked man'.
Le Grele was believed to be behind several murders over a decade from the mid-1980s. Among those thought to be his victims was Cecile Bloch, an 11-year-old girl who was reported missing after not arriving at school one day in 1986.
Police believe he grabbed her as she came out of the building's lift on her way to school and dragged her into the basement, Sky News reports.
Her parents died without knowing who killed their daughter and family lawyer Didier Seban said it was "painful to know that the criminal took his secrets with him".
Verove has been linked to crimes in 1980s and 90s including rape of minors, murder, attempted murder, armed robbery and kidnapping of minors, Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau said.
Police were finally closing in on the cop when he took a lethal dose of medication, leaving a suicide note that said: "I admit being a great criminal who committed unforgivable acts until the end of the 1990s," Le Parisien reports.
According to local reports, the note stated that he was not well at the time he committed the heinous crimes, however later "got himself together".
He was said to have confessed to murders without details of the victims or circumstances, according to Le Parisien.
Prosecutors have since said his DNA matches samples found at crime scenes linked to Le Grele, Le Parisien said.
According to Le Parisien, Verove is also the suspect in another murder near Paris, of 19-year-old Karine Leroy, in 1994 in the city of Meaux.
He is also thought to have strangled a couple to death in the central Marais district of the capital in 1987. In three separate attacks, he had identified himself as a policeman.
Verove was said to have been married with two children. Neighbors said he was a family man who led a quiet life.