A couple from Carcans (Gironde) who planned to “sacrifice” their five-year-old child in Western Sahara. This is the terrifying scenario that investigators from the Lesparre-Médoc brigade, the Bordeaux research section and the Spanish Civil Guard managed to thwart just before Christmas. 20 minutes takes stock of the investigation.
How was the alert given?
A report was made on December 19 “outside the department” of Gironde, by a friend who, “frightened by the declarations of the couple – and in particular of the man – on their project targeting their five-year-old child”, is went to raise the alarm at a gendarmerie, explained to 20 minutes the commander of the Lesparre-Médoc brigade (Gironde) Cédric Roger. The father was in fact making “delusional comments and was planning to go to the Maghreb in the company of his wife and their son to undertake a form of initiatory journey” indicated Wednesday to 20 minutes the Bordeaux prosecutor’s office. The prosecution opened an investigation on the same day, entrusted to the Lesparre research brigade and the Bordeaux research section.
How was the couple arrested?
The investigators determined “very quickly that these people had taken the direction of Spain” continues Commander Cédric Roger. According to a source close to the investigation, they left Carcans, northwest of Bordeaux, on December 16 in a 4×4 purchased very recently, after subletting their apartment. They spent a night at the hotel before sleeping at a friend’s house in Hérault.
“The technical investigations and the very good cooperation with the Civil Guard, via the CCPD [Centre de coopération policière et douanière d’Hendaye], made it possible to determine that their plan was to reach the Sahara to subject their son to a pseudo-initiation rite, continues Commander Cédric Roger. Their wish was to cross the Mediterranean to reach Africa. »
The prosecution opened a judicial investigation on December 20 on charges of “arrest, kidnapping, sequestration or arbitrary detention of a minor hostage aged 15 to facilitate a crime or misdemeanor” against the couple. He was arrested at the port of Algeciras on December 21 by the Spanish Civil Guard. “We had to react very quickly in a very short time, with people who descended quite quickly on the south of Spain, underlines the gendarmerie commander. This is what saved the child. »
What were they planning to do with their child?
The Civil Guard spoke of a desire to “sacrifice” the child in a press release announcing on Saturday the arrest of the two parents, who were the subject of a European arrest warrant. “There is a notion of sacrifice that had to be made on December 25, and crossing the desert seemed to be a founding act,” explains 20 minutes Commander Cédric Roger. Several scenarios are possible, we can imagine that the child could have been abandoned there. Furthermore, the father’s name is Gabriel, the mother’s name is Marie, and for them this represents signs… I don’t know if they belonged to a formed sectarian group, but we are at least on something of the order of the sectarian drift. »
What do we know about this couple?
The couple had “the behavior of real parents, loving, very attentive, very supportive and there was nothing to suggest that they could have this type of behavior towards their child”, who was not in school, explained to AFP the mayor of the town. The two parents were also “well integrated into the village” where they had founded “a beautiful music school” which welcomed “up to more than 250 students”. However, a shopkeeper mentions parents in the village who “withdrew their children from the music school because he made, let’s call it mean, remarks towards the students”. “Professors with whom they worked subsequently resigned,” she adds.
On the gendarmerie side, “we did not know this couple, and we had never intervened at their home” assures Commander Cédric Roger. However, the gendarmes during their investigation were able to determine that there had been “a precedent” very recently with the father of the child. “During the Ciaran storm, he was discovered in a tent, in the simplest apparatus, in the middle of the forest near Castelnau, which led to his compulsory internment at the Charles-Perrens psychiatric hospital in Bordeaux, from where he left after a few days. »
Where are the parents and child today?
This Thursday, the couple was still being held in pre-trial detention in Spain, as part of an ongoing extradition procedure. “The child was entrusted to Spanish social services following an emergency provisional placement order taken by the Bordeaux public prosecutor’s office and his return to France is also being finalized,” the public prosecutor’s office said on Wednesday.