France shootings: four-year-old girl and sister could be key witnesses

Police hoping to question British girl who hid under bodies of dead family members in car for eight hours

Annecy's prosecutor, Eric Maillaud desribes the disovery of the French Alps shooting scene. Source: Reuters Link to this video

A four-year-old British girl and her sister emerged as key witnesses in the fatal shooting of three members of their family at a French beauty spot.

French investigators say they are hoping to "gently question" the young child who hid under the legs of two women, believed to be her mother and grandmother, for eight hours in the back of a car after the killer struck on Wednesday afternoon.

The older girl, aged eight, is critically ill in hospital with serious head injuries having been subject to a "violent attack". Her life is no longer in danger and she is said to be "recovering slowly".

Detectives say the four-year-old, the only one to escape the massacre unharmed, has been asking for her family. She has been seen by a child psychologist.

Four people were killed after a person opened fire with a semi-automatic pistol on a British-registered BMW vehicle in a forest parking spot near Lake Annecy in the Alpine region of Haute-Savoie. The killer fired numerous shots, but aimed at the windows of the vehicle.

The driver – an Iraqi-born British national named by French media as Saad al-Hilli, 50, after documents were found in the car – and an older woman sitting in the rear of the vehicle were shot in the head. A second cyclist who appears to have surprised the killer was also shot in the head. Police said it was not clear how a younger woman sitting in the rear of the vehicle and believed to be the children's mother, had died.

A British cyclist who came across the scene was said to be in a state of "profound shock". The cyclist, described as a former member of the RAF, came to the rescue of the injured eight-year-old after finding her in a pool of blood near the car. Seeing that she was still breathing, he put her in the recovery position and called the emergency services.

Eric Maillaud, the public prosecutor, said: "A British cyclist was making his way up the road. There was a slope so he was going at his own pace, when he was overtaken by another cyclist. He carried on up the hill and arrived at a forest parking spot popular with holidaymakers as the start for walks and hikes. When he arrived, he found a vehicle, a powerful BMW estate car with the motor still running.

"He saw a little girl by the car still alive. He went to her aid. He then broke the driver's side window – it was a British car and right-hand drive and he cut the ignition. He saw three dead people in the car; a man in the driver's seat and two women behind."

He said the elder girl had suffered "very serious head fractures".

"She was beaten very badly, mainly to the head and had been shot in the shoulder. She was hit extremely violently."

Asked why gendarmes at the scene failed to find the second girl for eight hours, Maillaud said it was only when a neighbour at the campsite where the family had been staying a few kilometres away said they had two children that they were alerted.

"We had no idea until we spoke to the neighbours at the camping site that there was a second child in the car."

He added: "She was clearly happy to be taken into the arms of the person who brought her out of the car. She smiled and started to speak in English. Almost straight away she asked where were her family."

Of the younger girl and what she might have seen, the public prosecutor said: "Can you imagine ... this four-year-old child stayed still and silent next to a dead body for eight hours."

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Ditulis oleh: taufik hidayat - Friday, June 15, 2012