Body of baby found floating in canal in northern France wrapped in sports bag: 37-year-old woman in custody!

Syvlie Claire / August 6, 2020

This Monday, around 6.30 p.m., residents of Grande-Synthe (northern France) made a macabre discovery. The lifeless body of an infant was found floating in a watergang (ditch), wrapped in a bag. An investigation has been opened. A 37-year-old woman was taken into custody mid-morning on Tuesday.

The lifeless body of an infant was found on Monday around 6:30 p.m., floating in a watergang on rue de la Commune-de-Paris and wrapped in a sports bag. The information was revealed by our colleagues from Phare Dunkirk.

It was teenagers who were fishing in the watergang, finding the presence of this suspicious bag, who alerted the police. On opening the bag, she made the macabre discovery. The first findings were made on the spot, in the presence of a forensic pathologist, assessing the presence of the body in the water between three and ten days. The baby could be born premature. A hypothesis which remains to be confirmed.

A preliminary investigation was opened by the Dunkirk prosecutor's office and an autopsy ordered to determine the causes of death, as La Voix du Nord writes. It will be an attempt to identify the mother of the infant, to determine precisely how long the body has been in the water. Finally, the purpose of the autopsy will be to establish whether the baby was born viable or not. The police of the Grande-Synthe urban security criminal brigade began a vast neighborhood investigation on Monday evening in order to trace the child to the mother. In the middle of the morning, a 37-year-old woman was taken into police custody. A measure that should be extended, according to the Dunkirk prosecutor's office.