Prosecutor Appeals Charges in 1987 Cold Case of Child Found Dead Along French Highway

In a press release issued on Friday, December 2, 2022, the Blois public prosecutor, Charlotte Beluet, announced that the investigating judge is requesting the "referral to the assize court of the parents of the little Inass Touloub for intentional violence resulting in death without intent to do so in the case of the mother, and for complicity in the case of the father, taking into account the aggravating circumstance that this crime was committed against a minor under 15 years of age by a legitimate ascendant".

This contradicts the Blois public prosecutor’s office, which had requested the referral of the child’s parents, Ahmed Touloub, 70, and Halima El Bakhti, 68, to the assize court for aggravated voluntary manslaughter for the mother, and complicity in aggravated murder for the father. Until now, the victim’s parents faced life imprisonment. After taking note of the indictment order retaining different criminal charges, the Blois public prosecutor’s office has appealed.

The facts date back to August 10, 1987. That day, Ahmed’s family was preparing to go to Morocco. At night, Halima would have pushed Inass down the stairs. The little girl was no longer moving. The father had meanwhile returned home. His wife told him that the child had fallen down the stairs leading from her room to the toilet. Except that Inass’s two older sisters, aged 8 and 6, would have told their father that it was their mother who pushed Inass down the stairs "saying she didn’t know how to go down to the toilet alone".

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Inass’s death was a heavy family secret well kept for decades. It was only after more than 30 years that the investigators came across a lead. This includes DNA samples taken from one of her brothers arrested in the context of another case (a simple brawl) in 2016, which allowed them to reveal the identity of the child’s body found in a ditch of the A10 highway near Blois (Loir-et-Cher).