A tragic discovery. An eight-year-old little girl was found dead in an apartment in Colmar (Haut-Rhin) where her mother, aged 21 and without a criminal record according to France Bleu Alsace, was arrested before being hospitalized in psychiatry, a- we learned Monday from a judicial source.
“Several hypotheses, not just criminal ones, are being examined by investigators. There are many question marks and this woman is presumed innocent, great caution is required,” argued the Colmar prosecutor, Jean Richert.
Elements “suggestive of lesions”
Police responded around 10:40 a.m. Sunday to an apartment where a 30-year-old woman was screaming and throwing objects out of the window.
The police used their electric taser to try to control her and then managed to handcuff her on the ground to arrest her.
Her eight-year-old daughter was found dead in her bed. “There are indications of injuries to the face and chest, the origin of which remains to be confirmed. We cannot yet conclude on a specific cause of death,” said the Colmar prosecutor.
An autopsy must be performed
The mother was briefly placed in police custody for voluntary homicide aggravated by two circumstances: by an ascendant and on a minor (under) 15 years old. Given her state of mental health, deemed incompatible with police custody, she was hospitalized in psychiatry.
An autopsy of the child’s body must be carried out. “It will be a question of characterizing the lesions in more detail, of determining what caused the death, and of comparing these elements with the mother’s explanations, when she can be heard,” added the magistrate.
“To this day, the question is whether this woman could have killed her daughter in a fit of rage, or whether she could have decompensated after discovering that the little one was dead. This is one of the hypotheses to be studied.”
“The little girl attended a primary school in the town. Our education service and National Education are mobilized to support their comrades and the educational community, in the face of this horrible tragedy” wrote the mayor of Colmar Éric Straumann on Facebook, welcoming the intervention of the emergency services “very tested by this terrible scene” .
