The procurator fiscal was inclined to grant the family's request, not out of consideration for the state of the accused, but out of respect for the honour and misery of the family: 'It is at the request of this much wronged honest family', he wrote to Joly de Fleury, who have only slender means, and who have six children of tender age left by Bourgeois who is now reduced to a state of atrocious poverty, that I have the honour to send your Highness the enclosed copy, so that under your protection the family might be authorised to have this man locked up, an individual who could bring dishonour upon them through the mad conduct that he has all too often demonstrated for some years now.