Police in Portugal have arrested a French former police officer suspected of killing his partner and his former partner after kidnapping them and their children. The 42-year-old is also a fathers' rights activist, who had been involved in a bitter custody battle with his former partner.
Cedric Prizzon, a one-time member of the Paris police and former rugby league youth international, is suspected of killing two women whose bodies were found buried in the Serra da Nogueira mountain range in northern Portugal on Wednesday.
Portuguese police said they found the two bodies buried "in an isolated place", one day after stopping Prizzon in a car near Meda – around 150 kilometres from the site.
He was travelling with his two children, a boy of 12 and an 18-month-old baby girl.
Officers found a pump-action shotgun, fake documents and number plates, and €17,000 in cash in the vehicle.
Police said the two bodies found were the "partner and ex-partner" of the suspect, but that "procedures to identify the victims and consolidate the evidence are ongoing".
A court in Vila Nova de Foz Coa, not far from where Prizzon was detained, took him into custody on Thursday evening following several hours of questioning.
He is suspected of aggravated homicide, desecrating a corpse and kidnapping, judicial officials said.
The two children are to be returned to France, authorities said.
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Fathers' rights activist
French police had been looking for Prizzon since the two women were reported missing last Friday from their homes in the Aveyron area in the south of France.
The alarm was raised by a relative of Prizzon’s former partner, who found it strange that she had not shown up to her job at an insurance company and that her son was not at school.
Prizzon's new 26-year-old partner and their baby daughter were also missing from their home in the nearby village of Savignac.
According to Portuguese media, Prizzon's eldest son provided information that led the authorities to the Serra da Nogueira location where the bodies were buried.
The investigation is now being led by the French public prosecutor's office in Montpellier.
In a bitter battle against his former partner over their son, Prizzon had mounted a campaign against her on social media, accusing her of endangering their child.
The suspect was also active in an organisation defending fathers' rights.
He had been stripped of his custody rights after he illegally took his son to Spain for several weeks in 2021.
(with newswires)
