The Pastor family had controlled a significant portion of Monaco’s real estate for nearly a century, building a fortune that made them second only to the ruling Grimaldi dynasty. Hélène Pastor, the heiress to this empire, was known locally as the "vice princess" for her family’s shadowy influence over the principality. Her wealth was estimated in the billions, anchored by a portfolio of luxury apartment buildings that dominated the coastline. Yet, for all her power, her greatest vulnerability lay in her own generosity, which came in the form of monthly allowances of €500,000 to each of her two adult children.
That financial dependency created a dangerous dynamic. Her daughter, Sylvia, had been married for nearly three decades to a Polish man named Wojciech Janowski, a man whose charm masked a history of fraud and fabricated credentials. Janowski had infiltrated the family by marrying Sylvia in 1986, and for 28 years, he lived off the Pastor fortune while running businesses that existed only on paper. He claimed to be a Cambridge graduate and a hotel magnate, but investigators later found his résumé was built on forged documents and his companies were little more than shells designed to launder his wife’s money.
By 2014, Janowski’s financial web was collapsing. He had siphoned millions from Sylvia’s accounts, taken out secret mortgages on properties meant for their daughter, and faced mounting debts and potential criminal prosecution. The only thing standing between him and total ruin was Hélène Pastor herself. If she died, Sylvia would inherit the entire fortune, and Janowski would control it through his wife. The solution, he decided, was murder.
On May 6, 2014, Hélène Pastor was leaving the hospital after visiting her stroke-afflicted son when her chauffeur-driven Lancia was ambushed at a traffic junction. A gunman fired a shotgun through the passenger window, hitting her multiple times in the jaw, neck, chest, and abdomen. The chauffeur, Mohamed Darwitch, was also shot multiple times. Both were rushed to the hospital, but Hélène died nine days later from her injuries. Darwitch survived but was left permanently scarred.
The attack initially appeared to be a botched robbery, but investigators quickly realized it was something far more calculated. The gunmen had been hired for €30,000 each, a paltry sum for a hit on one of Monaco’s wealthiest women. They had arrived by taxi, botched their escape, and left a trail of DNA evidence, including a shower gel bottle in their hotel room. Within weeks, the trail led back to Janowski, who had paid the hitmen through a series of Dubai bank withdrawals totaling €200,000.
The mastermind’s downfall came when the getaway driver, a personal trainer named Pascal Doryak, confessed. Doryak had been paid €140,000 to coordinate the hit and had been promised a bonus if Hélène’s handbag was stolen to make the murder look like a robbery. He testified that Janowski had explicitly ordered the killing, even specifying that both Hélène and Darwitch should be killed to eliminate witnesses.
Janowski was arrested in June 2014, along with Sylvia and several others. He maintained his innocence throughout the trial, claiming that his confession had been coerced and that he was being framed by the real culprits. But the evidence was overwhelming. Intercepted letters showed him plotting to blame the victim’s son, and financial records proved he had paid the killers. In October 2018, he was found guilty of ordering the assassination and sentenced to life in prison. His appeal was rejected in 2021, and he remains behind bars.
The murder shattered the Pastor family. Sylvia lost her mother, her partner, and her brother, who died of a stroke shortly after the trial began. The family’s real estate empire continues to operate, but the dynasty that once ruled Monaco’s skyline is now a shadow of its former self. Janowski’s name has become synonymous with greed and betrayal, a cautionary tale about the dangers of wealth and the people it attracts.