A 54-year-old woman was stabbed to death Sunday in her home in Le Lamentin, central Martinique, and a suspect was arrested by a neighbor and later handed over to police. The body was discovered on Sunday afternoon by neighbors who alerted police, firefighters told AFP.
These neighbors also neutralized and tied up a suspect who was present at the time the body was found, pending the arrival of police and gendarmes. The 54-year-old man was taken into custody as part of a deadly investigation.
When firefighters arrived, the victim’s body had multiple stab wounds, likely inflicted by a cutlass, a knife traditionally used on the island to cut sugarcane. According to the lawsuit, the suspect is not the victim’s boyfriend, but their relationship remains to be determined.
The public prosecutor confirmed to AFP that this was the first of 19 murders of a woman in Martinique since the beginning of the year.
Local women’s associations responded immediately to the crime. “Facing an increase in violence [en Martinique], What role does violence against women play in our policy proposals? No!“, the UFM, the Union of Women of Martinique, regretted in a press release. “This is the first female massacre since the beginning of this year, but all these women are being killed slowly, psychologically, morally.“, says AFP Georges Arnaud, co-founder of the association Cultural Equality.
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