the main suspect placed in police custody, the investigation reclassified as “assassination”

The teenager was stabbed Tuesday evening “while interposing during an altercation”, the Valencia prosecutor’s office said. Three other people were taken into custody on Thursday.

The man suspected of having fatally stabbed a 15-year-old in Romans-sur-Isère (Drôme) on Tuesday, was taken into police custody on Thursday April 11, announced the Valencia public prosecutor. “At the end of the morning today, the main suspect on the run until then (…)[est] here[é] spontaneously to the investigation service”specified Laurent de Caigny.

Since then, three other people, including a father and his two sons, have been placed in police custody as part of an investigation for “assassination”, the Valencia prosecutor’s office announced on Thursday. The father and a minor son went to the police in the evening. Another son, aged 27 and suspected of being the author of the fatal stabbing, had done the same a few hours earlier, the prosecutor explained in a press release. They were placed in police custody, like another person arrested on Wednesday and suspected of having helped them flee the sensitive Monnaie district.

“All the suspects” are “now arrested” and the investigation continues “under the qualification of assassination, that is to say premeditated murder, a crime punishable by life imprisonment”said the prosecutor.

Suspects found thanks to video surveillance

The events occurred on a public highway on Tuesday evening in the La Monnaie district. The teenager was stabbed “by interposing during an altercation”had specified the Valencia prosecutor’s office. Witnesses and video surveillance allowed investigators to “target suspects and in particular the probable perpetrator of the fatal blow” who are “very actively sought”prosecutor Laurent de Caigny then explained to AFP. “An individual linked to the suspects” was arrested, he said.

According to two witnesses, “several members of the same family from a district outside that of La Monnaie had come in vehicles” Tuesday evening to look for a “opposite protagonist”, continued the prosecutor. CCTV cameras confirmed “vehicle movements mentioned by witnesses”, but do not have “fatal altercation not recorded.”