At 10 years old, his bruised body was found by his older brother in May 2022 in their home in Haute-Savoie. Little Celia had been beaten, strangled and then partially burned. His father, Cyrille Picard, considered the main suspect, has been on the run ever since. The 54-year-old, who is the subject of an international arrest warrant, is considered "dangerous" by Europol, the body that collaborates with the Old Continent's police forces, and has become one of the most wanted French nationals in Europe.
In 2022, the 12-year-old is in the process of separating. A mediator then advised her partner, Celia's mother, to leave the matrimonial home in Veigy-Foncenex (Haute-Savoie), located on the Swiss border, near Geneva. On May <>, a week after the girlfriend left, Cyrille Picard contacted her to return. But she refuses. The father of the family loads his American Staff, Tyson, into his car, and is seen leaving the house.
In the evening, their eldest son returns home and discovers Celia's body, partially burned. The autopsy revealed that she had been beaten and then strangled. His body was burned because the perpetrator allegedly tried to set fire to the house before fleeing.
#MostWanted | Cyrille Picard is the most wanted French fugitive in Europe, suspected of the murder of his daughter. Every detail can be important to help the #PoliceJudiciaire and @Europol find it https://t.co/iDF3voMuaY https://t.co/4cX4wVTyoh pic.twitter.com/6clh8SjIjC
— National Police (@PoliceNationale) January 15, 2024
"Cyrille Picard is wanted for the murder of his daughter on May 12, 2022. Aged 10, she was found strangled and beaten, next to a fire starting," Europol wrote on the file. According to the agency, the man has been "on the run" since then and "was last seen a few days after the incident, on the French west coast with his dog Tyson."
According to his profile, Cyrille Picard is "considered dangerous" because, in particular, "he knows how to handle weapons and is able to live with very few resources".
The gendarmes of the Chambéry research section had received many testimonies from Charente-Maritime and his last sign of life dates back to May 15, 2022, when he abandoned his Citroën Jumpy in a parking lot in Meschers-sur-Gironde, where the suspect had ties.
'Escape route' and disturbing personality
Investigators believed that the suspect continued on a southwesterly basis. The Dauphiné Libéré wrote at the time that the 50-year-old, who "has an excellent level of sailing", was likely to leave the country by sea. According to Europol, the man speaks Spanish.
"There are troubling aspects to his escape route and the suspect's personality," the police's National Fugitive Search Squad (BNRF) said in a short video.
But since then, the judicial investigation opened for "murder of a minor under 15 years of age" and "destruction by dangerous means" has yielded nothing and the fugitive is still being sought. The investigation has been entrusted to the research section of the Chambéry gendarmerie.
#BeOurNextHero | 🦸 Awaken your inner superhero! Because every trivial detail can lead to the resolution of a criminal case. The #PoliceJudiciaire and @Europol need you!
🕵️ ♀️ Help us find Cyrille Picard!@Gendarmerie @prefpolice... pic.twitter.com/PZ7wesrqTr
— National Police (@PoliceNationale) December 12, 2023
In October 2022, Annecy public prosecutor Lise Bonnet-Mathys told the Dauphiné Libéré: "We don't know if he is alive or dead and no hypothesis is favoured at the moment."