Vanilla photo released by authorities. – Ministry of Justice
The little Vanille, one year old, for whom a kidnapping alert had been triggered on Saturday evening, was found dead late Sunday afternoon in Angers, in a clothing container, and her mother placed on guard for “aggravated murder After his confession.
The mother of little girl, Nathalie Stephan, 39, had been found alone Sunday morning in a hotel in Nantes, which had raised concern for investigators.
“The mother confirmed to us that she gave death to her child on Friday, even before the time when she was to deliver it. After a long period of confidence on the part of the investigators, she agreed to tell them where she had put the body of her child, next to her home, and led the investigators to this place, “the prosecutor said Sunday evening of the Republic of Angers Eric Bouillard, during a press conference.
“Very few explanations for his gesture”
During her police custody, Nathalie Stéphan, who presents significant psychiatric disorders, had provided explanations “a little fanciful”, according to the prosecutor, indicating initially to have entrusted her child to a friend, then to have killed him ” by suffocation or strangulation ”.
A mode of operation which still remains to be established, just like the motivations. “She provided very little explanation for her action. We will try to have a little less confusion in the explanations given to us, “said Eric Bouillard.
The custody of Nathalie Stéphan continues for “murder of a minor by ascendant” until Tuesday morning at the latest, he added. After this police custody, she could be hospitalized or detained. The “kidnapping alert” device was lifted.
“The moment when the mother gave death to her child, she places it on Friday. Friday at the very beginning of the afternoon she is indeed still accompanied by her child and from the middle of the afternoon, she is no longer “, said the prosecutor, who considers that the facts have probably happened” between 1 pm and 3 pm ”.
“In great difficulty”
Nathalie Stephan had been staying for a year in the Angers maternal center, a home for pregnant women and single mothers. His daughter had been entrusted to Child welfare (ASE) and placed with a foster family by the children’s judge, but she could continue to see her mother regularly for a set time during the week.
The mother left the home at 11 a.m. on Friday and should have brought her daughter at 5.30 p.m. to her ESA counselor. She had already brought another child in the past outside the time limits, said the prosecutor, who described Nathalie Stéphan as a woman “in great difficulty, without a friendly network”. The 30-year-old had also experienced a suicidal episode several months ago.
Regarding the triggering of the “kidnapping alert” device, Eric Bouillard acknowledged that the fatal outcome was “necessarily a failure” but that he had nevertheless enabled “very quickly to find the mother and the child’s body” .
“The mother presented a priori no danger”
Regarding the period of twenty-four hours between the non-delivery of the child and the triggering of the plan, the deputy of the Attorney General of the Republic of Angers Catherine Vandier had explained in the morning that “the mother did not present a priori of danger ”, having the child“ in a completely legal manner ”.
“The time that the people who were to pick up the child appear, look for the child themselves locally”, that we “study all the tracks of the environment of the mom, that we physically check every places where the child is likely to be, all that time passes and then, then, we decide that it is truly worrying, ”explained Catherine Vandier.
“At no time has the mother ever endangered any of her children,” the prosecutor reiterated Sunday evening.
