French father suspected of killing wife and children ‘heard voices’
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The outside of the building in Meaux, north-east of Paris, where the bodies of a woman and her four children were discovered in a ground-floor flat.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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BOBIGNY, France – A 33-year-old Frenchman who admitted to killing his wife and their four children claimed he “heard voices” telling him to “cause harm”, a prosecutor said on Dec 28.
French police on Dec 26 arrested a man with a history of psychiatric illness on suspicion of murdering his Haitian-born wife and their children aged nine months and four, seven and 10 years.
Their bodies had been found on Christmas Day at their home in Meaux, east of Paris.
The man, a plumber, has been receiving treatment since 2017 for depression and psychotic behaviour.
Meaux public prosecutor Jean-Baptiste Bladier, citing the results of Dec 27’s autopsy, said the children’s 35-year-old mother and her 10- and seven-year-old daughters had received “around 10 stab wounds each” which had been “administered with great violence”.
The four-year-old and nine-month-old boys “died of asphyxia following drowning”, he added.
The suspect was to appear before an investigating judge on Dec 28. The prosecutor has requested that he be remanded in custody.
The suspect said that he had “not been able to identify a trigger for his act”, said the prosecutor. He has “felt nothing” and “felt empty” after murdering his family, the prosecutor added.
According to Mr Bladier, the suspect “indicated that he had been taking his daily medication” since 2019, but had not taken it on Dec 24.
Police discovered the bodies at a ground-floor apartment in a working-class district of Meaux at around 9pm on Dec 25.
Neighbours told police they had heard cries downstairs during the night of Dec 24 to 25, adding that they had seen traces of blood.
An inquiry has been opened into the murder of minors under 15 years old, and murder by a partner.
A floral tribute on the fence in front of the ground-floor flat where the bodies of a woman and her four children were discovered.
PHOTO: AFP
The man had been held in 2019 after stabbing his partner in the shoulder blade when she was pregnant with their third child and then trying to kill himself. She had refused to press charges.
‘Loved his children’
The man was arrested near his father’s home in the neighbouring town of Sevran.
“He loved his children, he loved his wife,” the suspect’s father, who had alerted police to his son’s presence after refusing to open the door, told broadcaster RMC.
“Maybe what he did there was unconscious, that he didn’t know what he was doing.
“I don’t understand it yet”.
The suspect’s sister was more outspoken, saying she had helped to raise him.
“There’s no one I loved more than my brother, from birth to the age of four,” she told RMC.
She blamed him despite his condition.
“No matter how many people tell me he’s crazy, I don’t give a damn, I blame him,” she said.
She described his slain wife Beatrice as “the strong woman, the fighter, a real lioness”.
Meaux public prosecutor Jean-Baptiste Bladier said the mother and her daughters had received “around 10 stab wounds each” which had been “administered with great violence”.
PHOTO: AFP
The couple, who had been together for 14 years and married since October 2023, had met in high school.
“She was always there for him, defending him. He couldn’t have found a better wife,” the sister said.
“She was the one who managed my brother’s medication, his medical appointments, his paperwork.”
The Paris region has recently seen a series of infanticides.
In November, a 41-year-old man confessed to killing his three daughters, aged four to 11. AFP
