Model Katoucha’s body found in the Seine

February 28 2008 — The body of former supermodel Katoucha Niane, 47, is found in the River Seine in Paris. She returned to La Petite Vitesse, her houseboat near the Alexandre III bridge, after a party on February 1. It is the last time she was reportedly seen alive. On February 4, police opened a missing person’s case after her handbag was found untouched outside the door to her boat. Her body is found near the Garigliano bridge, about 5km downstream, and her death declared an accidental drowning. Niane was born in Conakry, Guinea, on October 23 1960, the daughter of author and historian Djibril Tamsir Niane, who had a senior university position. In her 2007 autobiography, “Katoucha Dans ma hair” (In my flesh), she described a pleasant, privileged childhood that ended when she was nine. Her French-educated mother claimed to be taking her to the cinema to see the Beatles film “Help!”, but in fact surrendered her for genital mutilation (circumcision). The next year, her father sent her for safety to Mali, as Guinea’s post-colonial dictator, Ahmed Sékou Touré, had threatened him. She rejoined her family in Dakar, Senegal, at the age of 12. After marrying her husband at age 17 and giving birth to her first child, she ran away to France to become a model. “The Peul Princess” (a nickname in reference to her ethnic Fula background) modelled for Thierry Mugler, Paco Rabanne, Christian Lacroix and became known as Yves Saint Laurent’s “muse”. Niane stopped modelling in 1994 and started an organisation “for the battle against female circumcision”.