The 2.5-year-old child vanished on Saturday in a hamlet in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence. To find his trace, volunteers, soldiers and investigators have joined forces and considerable resources have been deployed. Unsuccessful so far.
The chances of finding Emile alive are dwindling. After four days of intense research in the hamlet of Haut-Vernet, in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, the little boy of 2 and a half years remains nowhere to be found. Investigators still have “no index, no element” who can explain the sudden disappearance of the child, Saturday July 8 at the end of the afternoon, as declared by the public prosecutor of Digne-les-Bains, Rémy Avon, during a press briefing on Tuesday evening.
For 96 hours, an entire village mobilized, with several hundred volunteers and many gendarmes, soldiers and firefighters.
The disappearance is reported late Saturday afternoon
The disappearance of the boy is reported to the authorities on Saturday at the end of the afternoon. Emile has just arrived for the summer holidays with his maternal grandparents and escaped their vigilance while playing in the garden. This is their second home, located in this hamlet of 25 inhabitants, more than a kilometer from the village of Vernet, northeast of Digne-les-Bains. In the House, “several other family members were also present”, but neither of the two parents of the child, specifies the parquet floor.
“By the time the family, relatives, neighbors carry out the first checks, the first call to the gendarmerie comes around 6 p.m.”, will explain the prosecutor. From 6:40 p.m., an important child search system is implemented with dog teams, two helicopters as well as drones, lists the prefecture of the department. The inhabitants of the sector mobilized very quickly and in large numbers: there were around a hundred to help the gendarmes, until 3 am. Research is unfortunately not facilitated by the topography of the place: the commune of Vernet is located in a mountainous and steep area, dotted with small streams.
A call for witnesses is launched at the national level
The next day, the device is gaining momentum. Sunday from 6 a.m., 30 gendarmes are mobilized, including soldiers from the High Mountain Gendarmerie Platoon (PGHM), as well as 20 firefighters and still a large team of volunteers, which is growing hour by hour to reach “nearly 200 people”, according to the prosecutor. A helicopter continues to fly over the area. Research is conducted with a strategy “said of the snail”, which first concentrates on the hamlet before expanding.
In the morning, the prefecture announces the opening of an investigation for worrying disappearance. The investigations are entrusted to the Marseille gendarmerie, supported by the research brigade of the Digne-les-Bains gendarmerie. At 6 p.m., while Emile is still nowhere to be found, the prosecution issues a call for witnesses. The photo of the little boy and his description – brown eyes, blond hair, 90 centimeters – are relayed in all the media. The case takes a national turn.
“The 48 hours are crucial to be able to optimize our chances and ensure that we can find him”, declares, during a first press briefing at 7 p.m., the prosecutor Rémy Avon, accompanied by the prefect of the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, Marc Chappuis. The magistrate explains in front of the cameras that “the research covered a perimeter of five kilometers” with “very important means”.
“No hypothesis is privileged”, he continues, specifying that the criteria for triggering an abduction alert are not “to date not reunited”. The prosecutor gives an important detail in passing: the child was seen in a downhill street by two neighbors, around 5:15 p.m. That’s when his trace was lost.
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Several houses in the hamlet are inspected and the search continues throughout the evening and part of the night from Sunday to Monday. Without giving anything.
Volunteers flock from all over the department
The race against time continues on Monday. If Emile is alive, he will have spent two nights outside, without eating or drinking. “The family has been coming every school holiday for about twenty years”testifies the mayor of Vernet, François Balique, to franceinfo.
“The more time passes, the more the anxiety grows.”
François Balique, mayor of Vernetat franceinfo
New means brought by the neighboring departments were attributed to the investigation, including a Saint-Hubert dog, with a very developed sense of smell. At dawn, “the research has resumed and intensified”, notes the mayor, who specifies that the perimeter has been widened. The momentum of solidarity is considerable: volunteers flock from all over the department, and from further afield, to take part in the hunts.
To increase the numbers, the departmental federation of hunters of the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence invites on its Facebook page “all volunteer hunters accustomed to walking in mountain terrain” to go to Le Vernet to take part in the hunts.
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In total they are “300” volunteers to mobilize, figures Cyril Genin, employee of the federation. One home renovation company even asked all of its salespeople, 25 in total, to help with the search. “We all answered present”, explains one of them, Alexandre Naudin.
“We each have children of the same age as Emile, we obviously felt concerned.”
Alexandre Naudin, a voluntary volunteerat franceinfo
Each small group, made up of about fifteen volunteers and supervised by firefighters and gendarmes, is responsible for combing the area with a fine-toothed comb. “We left the house and we raked, making lines with four meters apart between each person”, describes Alexandre Naudin. You have to be particularly “vigilant in areas with very tall vegetation”, numerous, underlines Cyril Genin, of the federation of hunters. “The child may be hiding or may have fallen, unconscious. We rake very tightly.”
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Despite this impressive mobilization, the little boy remains untraceable. A new press briefing is organized on Monday at the start of the evening. The prefect announces that the search will continue the next day but that the device will be adapted. “Concretely, we stop the beatings” to deploy “specialized means in search of traces and clues”he explains, assuring that “all hypotheses remain valid. None is privileged and none is excluded.”
Of “numerous witness hearings” are made, to no avail. All the houses in the hamlet, apart from two abandoned ones, were searched. The anxiety increases a little more.
The hamlet is completely cordoned off
Tuesday, it’s been almost three days since little Emile disappeared. A research device “more targeted” And “selective” is set up, without the help of volunteers this time but “with specialized personnel” and always the dogs “who are selective”, summarizes the prosecutor. The investigation is tightened on the hamlet of Haut-Vernet, completely cordoned off by the gendarmes, from 8 am. He is “prohibited to any foreign person in the village”relays the magistrate.
The site is again raked to the smallest corners. The 30 buildings there are inspected, 12 vehicles are searched and the 25 inhabitants are interviewed. A unit of sappers from the Foreign Legion specializing in the search for caches is mobilized: its members go so far as to probe bales of hay in search of “ferrous materials”, with specialized metal detectors, always with the aim of finding “the slightest trace”.
On social networks, theories are rife. Seers get involved and multiply lives or posts on TikTok to share their guesses. The prosecution insists on the fact “that there is no element characterizing a criminal offence”, whether it’s a homicide or a kidnapping. The investigation is still being conducted to “search for causes of worrying disappearance”.
The investigation takes a legal turn
Tuesday, the investigation is at a standstill. Investigators still have “no clue, no information, no element”, recognizes prosecutor Rémy Avron during a new press briefing. “We are at the same point as yesterday and the day before yesterday”, he bluntly admits. The hypothesis according to which Emile would have gotten lost is less and less probable and, if this is the case, his vital prognosis would undoubtedly be “very very committed”. The magistrate announces that, from now on, the investigation is moving into a second phase aimed at exploiting the data collected in the field.
A “considerable mass of information” collected must be processed, the investigative work enters a judicial phase. The telephone records of the inhabitants have already begun to be studied. Little by little, the technical and scientific police are deployed more, with, also, research on the file of sex offenders in the region. The research section of Marseilles, specialized in criminal investigations, is at work. Its members are deployed on the Vernet site. Others work from Marseille. All are grouped together in an investigation cell now “national”, increased from 15 to 20 gendarmes.
On Wednesday evening, the field research was “in the process of being completed”, announced the prosecutor. Ihe study of a trace of blood discovered on a vehicle in the hamlet gave nothing, it was animal blood, specified the magistrate. Accident, homicide, kidnapping? “All Assumptions” remain under investigation by the prosecution, which “does not forbid anything”. In a press release, Rémy Avon specified that the investigation would continue. “in particular by analyzing the considerable mass of information and elements collected over the past four days”.