French teen admits killing grandparents with her boyfriend: prosecutors

Police officers patrol the Trocadero plaza near the Eiffel Tower in Paris, Tuesday, Oct. 17, 2023. (AP Photo/Michel Euler, File)

A 16-year-old girl in France and her 15-year-old boyfriend have admitted stabbing her grandparents to death after they objected to their relationship, prosecutors said Thursday.

The girl lived with her grandparents, her legal guardians, in Villers-Semeuse in northeastern France, a town of 3,700 people whose mayor described the victims as “very active” members of the local community.

Public prosecutor Francois Schneider said the girl had told investigators she had planned the killings ahead of time, and that her boyfriend had “agreed to take part”.

The boyfriend snuck into the house at the weekend, angering the grandmother when she discovered him in her granddaughter’s room Monday morning, according to prosecutors.

The girl told investigators she then started stabbing her grandmother, 71. When the grandfather, 74, heard her cries and rushed to the scene, the boyfriend stabbed him, prosecutors said.

The teens inflicted a total of six knife wounds on the grandmother and five on the grandfather, Schneider said. Police found the bodies in the house’s basement Tuesday morning.

The teens were arrested that afternoon at a nearby industrial lot, after buying three high-end cell phones using thousands of euros they had found in a box in the grandparents’ room, Schneider said.

The girl told investigators her grandmother had slapped her because she objected to her relationship with her boyfriend, the prosecutor said.

The girl faces up to 30 years in prison if not tried as a minor, and the boy up to 20.