Tarbes justice is launching a call for witnesses on the sidelines of a case of attempted rape in Tournay and Capvern, where two women were attacked by an individual. Indicted and placed in pre-trial detention in March, this man in his thirties is described as a predator. Justice wants to ensure that he did not cause other victims.
Did the man cause other victims? In March 2026, a thirty-year-old man was arrested and then indicted by an investigating judge from Tarbes for two attempted rapes committed in Tournay and Capvern, in the Hautes-Pyrénées. Faced with the profile considered particularly worrying of the individual, who resided in Lannemezan at the time of his arrest, and the modus operandi that he himself admits to having repeated, justice is launching a call for witnesses to find other potential victims.
The case began in April 2024, when a woman in her forties presented herself to the Tournay gendarmerie brigade. What she has just experienced freezes the investigators. While she was jogging at the end of the afternoon on an isolated path in the town, while listening to music through her headphones, she was suddenly attacked by a man appearing out of nowhere. The individual grabbed her breasts, made her fall to the ground, immobilized her by lying on top of her and tried to remove her pants. Silent, determined and with a blank look, he acts with great violence. So much so that the victim will keep traces of significant bruising on his body. The woman struggles and screams, so much so that she manages to scare away the attacker, who runs away.
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An investigation is immediately opened. The victim’s clothes are analyzed and reveal the presence of male DNA. But this one does not match any saved profile. Despite the description of the attacker’s physique by the victim, the investigations stalled for months.
Painstaking work
We will have to wait until October 2025 for a second report to relaunch the case. In Capvern, a woman in her fifties recounts a similar attack. Having gone to pick mushrooms in the forest around midday, she sees a man running behind her without suspicion. In a few seconds, he throws her to the ground, touches her and tries to unbutton her jeans. Luckily, the button resists. The victim screams and tries to escape in vain… but manages to grab a branch and hits the man. Again, he fled. On the advice of her mother, she filed a complaint with the Lannemezan gendarmerie, and the research brigade of the Bagnères-de-Bigorre company was jointly responsible for the investigation.
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“Quickly, a link was established between the two cases,” indicates the Bagnères-de-Bigorre gendarmerie company. “DNA analyzes carried out on the victims’ personal effects confirmed that it was the same individual. But his identity remained unknown.”
The investigators will then call on the work of a specialized service of the IRCGN, which uses research by relatives. This technique makes it possible to identify genetic profiles of individuals known to the justice system and who have a direct or indirect relationship with the person sought. “840 profiles were released. We therefore carried out work to cross-check administrative information, but also some kinds of family trees in the hope of finding a relative of the individual among these profiles,” explains the gendarmerie. A painstaking job that ended up paying off. The soldiers tightened their noose on a man who died but was convicted in the past for sexual assault, and whose son in his thirties resided in Lannemezan. “Targeted investigations into the latter made it possible to highlight a body of consistent evidence which led to his arrest,” adds the Bagnères company.
Uncontrollable impulses
Arrested in March 2026 at his home, the suspect was placed in police custody. “His DNA was then taken and matched that taken from the victims’ clothing. He quickly admitted the facts,” indicate the gendarmes. To investigators, he described uncontrollable sexual urges that began when he was a teenager. And to explain that he took action opportunistically, spotting single women in isolated places while he was driving.
This mode of operation, openly and in broad daylight, repetitive and impulsive, greatly worries the authorities. Because nothing today allows us to exclude the existence of other undeclared attacks. “This man is 1.75 meters tall, brown, short hair, black eyes and Caucasian.” Justice is launching a call for witnesses and invites anyone who has been a victim of similar acts to contact the Lannemezan gendarmerie brigade by contacting 05-62-50-17-70.
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