A teenager, known to the police and indicted for rape of a minor in another case, was arrested and taken into custody on Tuesday. The parents of the little girl had reported her disappearance at the beginning of the afternoon.
It is a news item that causes amazement in Rambervillers, a small town of 5,000 inhabitants in the heart of the Vosges. The body “without life” of a 5-year-old girl was found, “in a plastic bag”Tuesday, announced the prosecutor of Epinal (Vosges), Frédéric Nahon, in a press release, Wednesday, April 26. The magistrate also confirmed that a 15-year-old boy had been arrested at his home and taken into custody for murder of a minor. Franceinfo summarizes what we know of the circumstances of this tragedy.
A disappearance reported early Tuesday afternoon
The parents reported their daughter missing on Tuesday afternoon. In his press release, the prosecutor specifies that the girl’s mother noticed her disappearance at 2 p.m. and reported her to the Rambervillers municipal police around 3:10 p.m. “My daughter is out to play. She went first to the park, there was no one, she came back here, took the ball”, explained Wednesday morning the mother of the little girlquestioned in front of her home by several media, including France 3 Grand Est. “She was playing here outside and I was inside, I was with (my other) little girl. After twenty minutes, half an hour, I said to him: ‘Go see where your sister is’. She said to me: ‘She is no longer there'”she said, in tears. “They took away my life, I’m destroyed”added this mother.
“Shortly after this report”a 15-year-old boy took “tie up with the police”telling them “to be in the presence of the little girl”, continues the public prosecutor of Epinal in his press release. Police called upon then went to the young man’s home, “located less than 200 meters from the child’s family home”according The Lorraine Republican (article subscribers). It was there that the gendarmes discovered “the lifeless body of the little girl in a plastic bag”, says the prosecutor. “The help came, they tried to give cardiac massage, but there was nothing to do, it was too late unfortunately”also explained to AFP the mayor of Rambervillers.
A first contact to “cover the tracks”
Before discovering the lifeless body of the little girl, the municipal police and the gendarmes carried out searches. At this moment, “a young man approached (two) to give information, but which was false information. He said he actually saw a young girl in a place, opposite to where she was found. It was probably to confuse the tracks”told the mayor of Rambervillers to France Blue.
The town’s video surveillance system made it possible to trace the course of this young man, who was finally arrested on Tuesday afternoon. “He is the alleged perpetrator”added the mayor.
Teenager arrested in rape case
This 15-year-old teenager, placed in police custody for “murder of a 15-year-old minor”, is currently indicted as part of an open judicial investigation for kidnapping, rape and sexual assault on a minor, “for acts committed in February 2022”, announced the prosecutor of Epinal. Frédéric Nahon specifies that the teenager had been placed under judicial control in a closed educational center, “outside the department”, until February. On this date, his placement was lifted. This is the reason why “he had returned to the family home with follow-up by the judicial protection of youth”, says the prosecutor.
“It was only a few weeks ago that he reappeared on the territory of Rambervillers, which worried the municipal police a little bit, who were attentive”, the mayor of Rambervillers told AFP. “He would have lured young children to have inappropriate sexual gestures”said Jean-Pierre Michel.
Contrary to what the girl’s mother had implied Wednesday morning in front of journalists, he was not “locked up in a psychiatric hospital”. “A previously ordered psychiatric report concluded that there were no mental disorders”, says the prosecutor. The investigations were entrusted to the Nancy research section and a judicial investigation was opened by the prosecution for murder of a minor.
