The motive for five murders remains unclear; Suspect must undergo psychiatric examination.
Police in France have arrested a 33-year-old man suspected of murdering his wife and four children in a knife attack early on Christmas Day, a prosecutor said.
The 35-year-old mother and her two daughters, aged seven and ten, were stabbed several times in the night from Sunday to Monday, said public prosecutor Jean-Baptiste Bladier on Tuesday.
The two younger sons, ages nine months and four years, either suffocated or drowned, Bladier said.
Police broke in through a bedroom window of her ground-floor apartment and found a “very violent crime scene” covered in blood, the prosecutor said.
The bodies were found on Monday evening in an apartment in the town of Meaux, 40 km east of Paris, after friends and family raised the alarm.
The motive for the murders was unclear.
The suspect was arrested on Tuesday in front of his father's house northeast of the French capital, the public prosecutor's office said.
He told police: “He knew why he was being arrested and spoke of his unhappiness and depression,” Bladier said. He received medical treatment for his hand injuries.
The prosecutor of Meaux, Jean-Baptiste Bladier [Alain Jocard/ AFP]The suspect had already stabbed his partner once when she was pregnant with their older son in 2019, but the investigation was closed because he was declared mentally ill at the time of the attack, the prosecutor said. He was admitted to a psychiatric hospital in 2017 and also attempted suicide that year.
The couple has been together for 14 years and has known each other since high school, Bladier said. They had their four children before getting married in October.
Neighbors told investigators they heard screaming in the early hours of Christmas Day. The alarm was raised later in the day after the family received no response.
None of the family members' names have been released, in accordance with French law protecting minors who are victims of crime.
Authorities are opening investigations into five homicides and the suspect will undergo a psychiatric evaluation to determine next steps, the prosecutor said.
On average, a woman is killed every three days in France. Last year, around 118 women were killed by their partners or ex-partners in France.