The grandparents of a French toddler who went missing nearly two years ago in France have been arrested on suspicion of his murder, authorities said Tuesday.
Émile Soleil, a two-year-old boy, went missing from his grandparents’ home in a remote hamlet of the French Alps in July of 2023. Nine months later, his remains were found by a hiker near the village of Le Haut-Vernet.
Now, the boy’s grandparents and two of their adult children have been taken into custody, CNN reports.
The boy’s grandfather, Philippe Vedovini, and his wife, who was not named by prosecutors, were arrested this week on suspicion of “voluntary homicide” and “concealing a corpse,” a statement from the Aix-en-Provence public prosecutors said.
When Soleil first disappeared, there was no indication the toddler had been abducted, police said at the time. But when the toddler’s bones were found so close to the hamlet in an area that had been searched by authorities, questions were raised as to how they got there.
Soleil vanished the day after his parents dropped him off in Le Haut-Vernet to stay with his grandparents on a holiday.
Two witnesses told authorities they saw the boy walking on a downhill road not far from the family home shortly after he was reported missing.
The rugged terrain of the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence prefecture, where the small hamlet of Le Haut-Vernet is located, is popular with hikers for its rivers, ravines and steep paths, but makes for treacherous landscape for a toddler. The town is only home to about 130 inhabitants and has been described as a place where “everyone knows everyone.”
All 30 buildings that make up the hamlet were searched by investigators.
The case gripped the nation, particularly surrounding Vedovini, who CNN affiliate BFMTV reported was questioned by police over an alleged sexual assault and violence at a private school in the 1990s, where he was training to be a monk at the time. Vedovini has denied any wrongdoing related to that case.
Speculation that a development in the case was imminent resurfaced earlier this month when investigators returned to the village.
French media reported on Tuesday that the grandparents’ home was being searched and that police had seized one of their vehicles.