an alert triggered, the father suspected

An alert was triggered after the kidnapping of little Eya, 10, this Thursday morning, May 25, in Fontaine, in the suburbs of Grenoble. The father is the main suspect.

[Mis à jour le 25 mai 2023 à 21h06] After the kidnapping of little Eya, this Thursday, May 25 in Fontaine, in Isère, an alert was triggered, announced the public prosecutor of Grenoble, Éric Vaillant. According to preliminary information, the father and “a hooded accomplice” kidnapped the daughter, who was walking to school with her mother, by gassing her “with tear gas”.

According to the alert issued, the suspect is Khaled Sassi, Eya’s father. He is 53 years old, with brown eyes. He is “likely to travel on board a gray vehicle, Peugeot brand, type 306”. Also, he had been prohibited from approaching the mother and her daughter since 2018, and the little girl would be protected by a ban on leaving the territory until she reached majority. “The police services in Europe and Tunisia have already been informed of the searches launched”, we specify in the alert taken up by BFM TV.

According to Eya’s mother, whose comments were recorded in THE Dauphiné liberated, a tire on her car had been punctured two days in a row, hence the fact of walking to the little girl’s school. A car blocked them and the “ex-husband grabbed [l’enfant] by the hair and forced her into the backseat with him,” while the mother was gassed.

The father, the main suspect

Very quickly, the father of the child is identified as one of the two kidnappers. According to the mother, it is positioned at the rear of the vehicle. “I immediately recognized him since he was with his face uncovered,” she told the Dauphine. She also clarified a context of tension between her and her ex-husband, a 53-year-old Swedish-Tunisian. Married in 2012 in Tunisia, the couple then saw the birth of little Eya a few months later, in October. But the idyll is cut short. “I learned late that he had falsified papers so that our daughter also had a Swedish passport,” she said, referring to violence that led her to return to France with her daughter in 2017.

Since then, the divorce has not yet been pronounced and custody of the child is the subject of a real battle since if the mother lives in France, the father lives in Tunisia. According to the elements obtained by France Blue Iserethe individual is even subject to a ban on leaving the territory.

The kidnapping alert not (yet?) triggered

At this stage, the kidnapping alert procedure has not been triggered. It meets very specific criteria. The kidnapping alert is only activated if it concerns a proven kidnapping. It is also necessary that the public prosecutor, the only one authorized to trigger the device, is able to confirm that the life or the physical integrity of the child is in danger and that he has elements of location of the minor. or his captor. These criteria do not currently seem to be met.