By Daniela Volker Producer/director of A Killer's Homecoming

Hutu and Tutsi mixed marriages were common before the genocide

Theophile Ntaganda was jailed after killing his Tutsi wife's family during the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Now free, he wants his wife and children back. She wants him dead.

Can they ever come to terms with the past?

When we met, Theophile was one of 6000 men awaiting trial for genocide in a prison just outside Kigali. His was a tragic account of wrong inflicted on those he loved, and of loss.

A Killer's Homecoming 2100 GMT, BBC Two (UK) Sunday, 22 February, 2004

It was by no means unique, but there was something about Theophile that made him stand out. Maybe it was down to the pink, 1970s granny glasses he hardly ever took off.

Or of his sadness and regret - although I was never quite sure whether he regretted having killed, or the fact that he had spent the best part of a decade in prison as a result.

Screams

In 1994, Theophile Ntaganda was 38, lived in a rural area and had a photography studio on the main road to Kigali.

He was married to Odette, a beautiful Tutsi woman 15 years younger than him, and they had a two boys, two-year-old Sharif, and three-month-old Kofi.

He was considered very stylish, and was known by everybody as Biseruka, "The Good-looking One".

One of his [Theophile's] victims was a little girl he found in a box...he hacked her to pieces with a machete

On 6 April 1994, the genocide began, and each and every Tutsi became a target.

Over the next hundred days, around 800,000 people would be slaughtered as the government organised the Hutu to systematically wipe them out.

Theophile admits to four killings. One of his victims was a little girl he found in a box while looting. He hacked her to pieces with a machete.

Odette's mother and sisters took refuge in Theophile's house. But in early May, they were found by government soldiers.

Odette heard their screams, took the children and ran into a nearby sorghum plantation.

The soldiers accused Theophile, he says, of sheltering "cockroaches".

Theophile killed his mother-in-law and Odette's two sisters in 1994

He claims he gave them all the money he had on him, but they beat him up, took him to a scenic spot near the house, gave him a gun and forced him to kill Odette's family.

"It was the first time I'd held a gun," he said. "They put the gun on my shoulder and showed me what to do.

"Then they lined up the victims and I pulled the trigger and the gun went off. They fell on the ground immediately and I fell on the ground too.

"Then the soldiers took the gun and ran away".

Bigamy

Odette stayed in her hiding place until deep into the night. When Theophile finished burying his victims, he looked for his wife and children, and took them back home.

Odette believes she had a narrow escape, that he would have killed her too. But she stayed with Theophile, she says, because she had nowhere else to go. As a Hutu he was her ticket for survival.

Theophile maintains that he still loved Odette, and never stopped loving her. Even though, after his arrest in September 1994, he saw less and less of her, and the following year she stopped visiting him altogether.

If someone commits a crime he should be punished. A killer should be executed Odette

In 1997 Odette tried to divorce him - she'd hooked up with John, a fellow survivor and former friend of Theophile's from the village.

But she failed to obtain a divorce because Theophile had not been convicted of genocide yet.

Odette went ahead nonetheless and married John, whom she'd had children with. She became a bigamist.

Tables turned

In January 2003, Theophile was among 40,000 prisoners who were amnestied because they had confessed to their crimes and asked for forgiveness.

They were released from prison and, after a three month stint in a re-education camp, were free to return to their villages.

Theophile set out to piece his life back together. He knew that, under Rwandan law, he had custody of the children.

Theophile is trying to make a new home for his sons

But he also hoped to get Odette back.

His wife was not pleased at the news of Theophile's release: "If someone commits a crime he should be punished. A killer should be executed".

Kofi and Sharif feared Theophile might take them away; they had little memory of their father, he was a stranger to them.

I followed Theophile, Odette and the children throughout 2003. It was a journey that began in prison and ended in court - but, unexpectedly, it was not Theophile being tried for genocide.

The accused became the accuser, and Theophile sued Odette for bigamy, punishable with up to three years in prison...

It made me wonder whether, despite professing that he feels sorry, Theophile really understands the extent of his crimes.