The police have found the bodies of five newborns or fetuses in the home of a couple in the French city of Orange, in the Provence region, in the southeast of the country, according to various French media reports on Tuesday. The discovery occurred after the woman, 32 years old, gave birth over the weekend at her home to a healthy baby, following a pregnancy she denied having detected.
Her husband, who had taken her to the hospital after the birth, did not know she was pregnant, according to Le Parisien. The newspaper adds that the couple had previously had an argument about some cardboard boxes that the woman kept closed in the house. Taking advantage of his wife’s absence, the man decided to open them. He then discovered the decomposing corpse of a baby. He took the corpse to the hospital, which informed the police.
The man’s statements, in which he alluded to other possible cases of pregnancy denial, led the police to search the couple’s home on Monday night. There they discovered the skeletal remains of four other newborns, according to French media, wrapped in plastic bags inside the cardboard boxes. Medical investigations will have to determine the exact nature of the remains, as well as the circumstances and date of death.
The police have opened an investigation and the first forensic examinations, including an autopsy, are scheduled for Wednesday.
According to the Carpentras prosecutor’s office, a city near Orange, “it was the husband, distressed by the discovery, once again very late, of his partner’s pregnancy — who had given birth the day before at home before being taken to the hospital — who began to search and discovered what appeared to be human remains,” according to statements collected by France Info.
The couple, described as leading a quiet life, already have two children, aged eight and 12. The man works, while his wife is a housewife. She remains hospitalized and, for the moment, has not been taken into police custody.
The investigation has been assigned to the Subdirectorate for the Fight against Organized Crime and Specialized Delinquency.
This incident evokes other similar recent cases in France. Last February, a woman was arrested in Haute-Saône after the discovery of two babies in a freezer, while in 2022 two other newborns were found under identical circumstances in Bédoin, in the Vaucluse department — the same as the city of Orange.
In the most serious precedent recorded in France, Dominique Cottrez was sentenced in 2015 to nine years in prison for the death of eight newborns, after the court recognized an impairment of her discernment capacity.
