Marion Wagon disappearance: witness appeal launched 30 years on to trace suspect in Agen
A new witness statement has reignited the cold case of Marion Wagon, who disappeared in Agen in 1996. A witness appeal targets a man now in his sixties.
Fresh witness account revives inquiry into Marion Wagon's disappearance in Agen
Thirty years after Marion Wagon disappeared on 14 November 1996 in Agen (Lot-et-Garonne), a new witness statement deemed "very serious" by investigators has reignited this cold case, according to cnews.fr. Magistrates from the serial or unsolved crime unit (PCSNE) in Nanterre are preparing to launch a witness appeal to find a man who would now be in his sixties.
A 43-year-old woman recalls a disturbing stranger
The statement was collected last month by gendarmes from Bordeaux's investigation section, on the decision of judge Sabine Khéris, who heads the cold cases unit in Nanterre. It comes from a 43-year-old woman who, at the time, was a secondary school pupil. She claims to have been followed on the same day and at the same time as Marion's disappearance by a stranger near the girl's home.
According to her account, the man had followed her since she left her secondary school, located on Rue Paul-Dangla in Agen — the street where Marion Wagon, then aged 10, lived with her family. To escape him, the girl took refuge in a flat at 2 bis, Rue de Lisbonne, at her classmate's home. This address immediately caught the attention of the judiciary.
An address at the intersection of multiple pieces of evidence
Rue de Lisbonne lay on the usual route that Marion took to return from school. More significantly, at the time, sniffer dogs had detected the child's scent trail up to a storage room in the same building — a shed used by building workers to store their belongings and change clothes. One of these workers had been placed in custody but was later released for lack of sufficient evidence.
Thirty years after the events, the witness is still able to provide a precise description: the man was in his thirties at the time, had a dark complexion, brown hair, was well-dressed and wore, according to her recollection, a blue twisted-knit jumper. This suspect would therefore now be around sixty years old.
Marion's DNA, a decisive scientific advance
Judge Khéris also has an unprecedented technical element at her disposal. Less than a year ago, Marion Wagon's complete DNA was extracted from her personal belongings by the medico-legal haematology laboratory in Bordeaux, thanks to a recent technological breakthrough. This data now constitutes a key piece of the case file.
The judicial investigation is open for "arrest, abduction, detention or unlawful sequestration of a minor under 15 years of age".
Several leads still under examination
Investigators must still cross-reference this new lead with previous ones. Among these is a neighbour involved in a sexual assault case, who committed suicide two years after Marion's disappearance. Another lead concerns the uncle of one of the girl's friends, a young man in his twenties at the time, who had confessed to the murder before providing information deemed "incoherent" about where he would have hidden the body. This individual could be called in again by investigators.
The witness appeal, which is to be launched shortly, aims to identify or locate the man in the blue twisted-knit jumper, whose image has remained vivid in the witness's memory since that 14 November 1996.
Source: Google News LU FR