Mia Montemaggi was kidnapped Tuesday by three men, by cunning and without violence, while she was staying with her maternal grandmother – SEBASTIEN BOZON / AFP
- Mia Montemaggi, 8, was kidnapped Tuesday by three men, by cunning and without violence, while she was staying with her maternal grandmother who was in charge of her.
- Four suspects were arrested between Wednesday and Thursday in the Paris region. In police custody, they said they abducted the girl at the request of her mother, Lola Montemaggi, 28, who was no longer allowed to see her alone.
- According to our information, the suspects “were immersed in the survivalist movement”. Before the events, they were followed by the DGSI as part of an investigation conducted by the national anti-terrorism prosecution.
The operation was “very organized”, the techniques used sophisticated. Four men suspected of being the kidnappers of Mia, 8, were arrested between Wednesday and Thursday in the Paris region, and placed in police custody by the gendarmes of the Nancy research section. According to the public prosecutor of Epinal, Nicolas Heitz, they handed the girl over to her mother, who had lost custody of her, twenty minutes after having taken her from her grandmother in the village of Poulières (Vosges). If the mother and child have still not been found, these arrests nevertheless constitute “rapid and decisive progress in the investigation”, the magistrate stressed on Friday at a press conference.
To investigators, the suspects explained that Mia’s mother, Lola Montemaggi, had contacted them on the Internet “to recover her daughter from whom she considered herself unjustly separated, with the aim of going abroad”, added the prosecutor. An operation carefully prepared with her, which three of them claim and qualify as “extraction and exfiltration”. The suspects, who have no criminal record, “were bathed in the survivalist movement” and are “quite conspiratorial”, confides to 20 minutes a source close to the case. They had also been followed for some time by the DGSI as part of an investigation conducted by the national anti-terrorism prosecution.
A “resistant to the barbarity of this system”
The intelligence service also made contact on Tuesday evening, after the start of the kidnapping alert plan, with the Epinal prosecutor’s office. Testimonies collected by the gendarmes had put the investigators of the research section on the track of a Citroën C15, seen on the day of the events by several people near the place of the kidnapping. However, DGSI agents told the gendarmes that this car is used by a 58-year-old man who is in their sights. Living on Boulevard Jean-Jaurès, in the 19th arrondissement of Paris, he describes himself, according to Nicolas Heitz, as a “dissident person” and “resistant to the barbarism of this system”. He was arrested Wednesday evening and taken into custody around 8:30 p.m.
During the search of his home, investigators got their hands on “the script of a speech to be given in front of Mia’s grandmother to pretend to be an educator”, as well as “many cell phones”, he added. detailed the prosecutor. As for the Citroën C15, it was found in a box located not far from there. In custody, the suspect told the gendarmes to be “proud” of having “allowed a little girl to find her mother” by acting “like Arsène Lupine”. He refused to provide information that would allow the gendarmes to locate Mia and her 28-year-old mother.
“Suspicious bags” found
Another 23-year-old suspect was arrested Wednesday, around 8:45 p.m., at his home in Varenne, in Seine-et-Marne. The young man said he did so to “save the child’s life”. But he also admitted that he had “perhaps been able to be manipulated”, indicated the prosecutor of Epinal. At his home were found “suspicious bags”, containing a powder likely to be used in the manufacture of explosives, as well as a “recipe which can be likened to a recipe for making explosives”, explained to 20 minutes a judicial source, specifying that analyzes were underway.
What did they want to do with it? “We must remain cautious and measured. No weapons or explosives were found during the searches. The elements found do not seem to show that there was a risk of imminent action, adds this source. They were also not arrested as part of the open anti-terrorism investigation, but a kidnapping case. “
Two other suspects were arrested Thursday, one in Lilas (Seine-Saint-Denis), the other in Meurthe-et-Moselle. The public prosecutor of Nancy must request the opening of a judicial investigation. The four men will be presented, this Friday afternoon, to an investigating judge of the specialized interregional jurisdiction. The investigation, which mobilizes 90 soldiers, now relates to the count of “kidnapping of minors under 15 years committed in an organized gang”. Its authors face life imprisonment.
Anyone with information on this abduction is invited to call 0 800 36 32 68 or dial 17.