Two suspects were arrested Monday in Saumur (Maine-et-Loire), as part of the investigation into the kidnapping and then the rape of a 9-year-old girl the day before, in Villiers (Vienne), according to information revealed by Europe 1 and M 6 and confirmed by franceinfo.
The child was abducted by a man in a car on Sunday in a residential area of Villiers, a village of 950 inhabitants 20 km north-east of Poitiers, while she was going to look for bread on foot.
She was found quickly after being raped.
According to M 6, the two men were arrested in a stolen car which would belong to a septuagenarian also victim of an assault.
The two suspects were taken into custody.
Large research device
A hundred gendarmes from several units, supported by a helicopter, were mobilized on Sunday in the early hours of the investigation in an immediate intervention plan (ex-Epervier), initially triggered in three departments -Vienne, Deux-Sèvres, and Maine-et-Loire - a device which has since been lifted.
The investigation was entrusted to the gendarmes of the Poitiers research section.