A man arrested following the triple homicide of his ex-wife and his two children in Dreux

2023-05-27 14:37:10

Forensic officers outside the house where the bodies of a woman and two children were found in Dreux, northwestern France, on May 25, 2023. JEAN-FRANCOIS MONIER / AFP

A 46-year-old man, suspected of the homicides of his ex-wife and his two children found dead Thursday in Dreux (Eure-et-Loir), was arrested on Saturday morning May 27 in the Yvelines. “The ex-spouse of the deceased woman, and father of the two children who also died, was arrested in the town of Plaisir, in the Yvelines”announced the prosecutor of the Republic of Chartres, Frédéric Chevallier, in a press release, confirming information from Franceinfo.

Placed in custody, the suspect will be “heard by the judicial police of Orleans on the facts of aggravated voluntary homicides”, said the prosecutor. He was arrested on Saturday “following a call from an employee of a telephone shop”said the magistrate in his press release.

Already sentenced in 2021 for violence against his wife and daughter

This man had been wanted since the discovery Thursday of three bodies, that of a 36-year-old mother, her 13-year-old daughter and an 18-month-old baby boy, in their pavilion in Dreux. The bodies presented wounds, and the first observations led “to favor the use of a knife by the perpetrator”according to the magistrate, who had seized the territorial direction of the judicial police of Orleans.

Thursday morning, the mother of the family did not show up for a scheduled meeting with a relative, who alerted the firefighters.

On Facebook, this deaf man who speaks sign language had posted two messages claiming that his ex-wife had “already cheated” several times, and accusing him of hitting his daughter. He was sentenced in September 2021 for violence against his wife and daughter to one year in prison, including four months suspended probation, with a ban on contacting them.

The number of feminicides increased by 20% in France in 2021 compared to the previous year, with 122 women killed under the blows of their spouse or ex-spouse, according to the latest figures available from the Ministry of the Interior.

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The World with AFP