Dog teams specializing in the detection of human remains, supported by drones, were deployed Tuesday to Vernet, in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence as part of the investigation into the disappearance of Emile, a two and a half year old boy, we learned from the gendarmerie. The duration of this research, which began on Tuesday, is not known, the same source said, confirming initial information from BFM TV.
Emile was seen for the last time on Saturday July 8, at 5.15 p.m., alone, in a street in the tiny hamlet of Haut-Vernet, on the territory of the commune of Vernet. Since then, no trace of the child has been found.
Disappeared in a village
Haut-Vernet is about two kilometers from Vernet, the village of 125 inhabitants to which it is administratively attached, some 30 kilometers north of Digne-les-Bains. Emile, from La Bouilladisse, in the Bouches-du-Rhône, had just started his summer vacation with his maternal grandparents when he disappeared.
After his disappearance, the 30 houses of Haut-Vernet were searched, all the inhabitants questioned and all the vehicles inspected. Ninety-seven hectares of fields, woods or steep terrain were “carefully” scrutinized, prosecutor Rémy Avon said during the research, referring to “one of the most important judicial search operations ever conducted”.
“All avenues remain under consideration”
But all these operations, the first two days in the form of citizen beats with the help of hundreds of volunteers, sometimes from afar, then by gendarmes from the Marseille search section or the Digne search brigade, did not make it possible to find the trace of the child.
Opened in flagrance on Sunday July 9, the day after the disappearance of the boy, to find the causes of the worrying disappearance, the investigation has since been entrusted to two investigating judges from Aix-en-Provence. “All avenues remain considered, none being neither excluded nor privileged”, assured the prosecutor Rémy Avon at the time of the opening of the judicial investigation, on July 18.