Female hiker who discovered little Émile Soleil's remains in French Alpine village 'picked up skull and gave it to police' in major crime scene blunder

The hiker who found the remains of French toddler Émile Soleil reportedly picked up the two-year-old's skull and handed it over to local military police, it has emerged.

Ramblers found Émile's bones on Saturday in the idyllic Alpine hamlet of Le Vernet where he went missing last July. 

A source close to the investigation told MailOnline that only part of the body was found, with some bones and the skull being recovered.

Prosecutors have not yet given a cause of death, but said that forensic investigators were continuing to analyse the skull and bones that were found. 

However, sources close to the investigation have claimed police fear the hiker may have removed key evidence when she moved the remains with one insider telling Le Figaro newspaper 'it would have been better if she hadn't touched anything'.

The area has now reportedly been cordoned off and police are forensically studying the site where Émile's remains were found. Tests will also be carried out in an attempt to determine how long his body had stayed on that part of the ground.

Detectives launched a frantic search in the Le Vernet in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence back on July 8 after Émile's unexplained disappearance.

There had been no trace of the toddler since he went missing eight months ago, with investigators refusing to rule out any theory for the tragedy, including abduction and murder.

Émile was officially in the care of a local physiotherapist on the day of his disappearance, as his parents took a break.

Some of the boy's bones were discovered by a hiker on Saturday in an area of the tiny French village - just two days after police returned to the crime scene to re-enact what had happened.

Le Vernet's mayor François Balique told Le Figaro newspaper the remains were located 'on a path between the Church and Chapel' of the village - an area he said had previously 'been thoroughly searched by gendarmes' with a 'tooth comb'.

He said it was 'absolutely incomprehensible' that Émile got into trouble by himself.

'I can't help but believe that an adult is involved in this matter. Émile would never have gone alone to where he was found,' Mr Balique said.

This adds an extremely disturbing element to the progress of the investigation, a source has claimed, suggesting the remains had been deposited there some time after Émile's disappearance.

'It's unlikely animals would bring human remains back into the village where someone went missing,' the insider said. 'This leads to the theory that a person has brought Émile's remains back, and potentially very recently.'

National gendarmerie spokesperson Marie-Laure Pezant said anthropologists who are also 'specialists in soil analysis' are studying the site where the partial remains were found.

'We have experts from the gendarmerie’s criminal research institute who travelled to Haut-Vernet to be able to analyse the discovery area,' she said during a press briefing today, according to Radio France. 'This research will start with them today.'

She said the anthropologists hope to 'identify whether or not these bones were on site or whether they could have been brought back by different means: a human person, an animal which would have transported them or the weather conditions which would have modified the ground and which would have moved them so far.'

Pezant recognised there is 'a tiny chance' investigators missed the body when they carried out their previous searches.

She added: 'We had committed a lot of resources but given the configuration of the place with the abundant vegetation in July, it could have complicated the research and we could, perhaps, have missed it. It's a hypothesis that exists. Then, there is also the possibility that these bones were later brought back to the area.' 

Lead prosecutor Rémy Avon, who is heading the judicial inquiry into Émile's disappearance said the possibilities that Émile had been murdered, kidnapped, or got involved in an accident were all being looked at.

He confirmed that Émile's parents' home, in the southern town of La Bouilladisse, near Marseille, was searched back in July, while the grandparents homes nearby, and in the Alps, were also raided.

A witness claimed to have seen physiotherapist Vedovini, who had been caring for the toddler at the time, cutting wood outside his house around the time Émile is thought to have wandered off.

Vedovini is a devout Catholic who gave up a vocation to become a monk, in order to marry his wife, Anne Vedovini. 

They brought up 10 children, including Émile's mother, who is now known by her married name of Marie Soleil after she married Émile's father, Colomban Soleil, 26.

The extreme-right wing political background of the family has also been examined by police. Émile's father, Colomban Soleil, 26, was arrested for 'an attack on foreigners' in 2018. 

Émile's family had called on people to pray to Benoîte Rencurel - a French shepherd said to have seen apparitions of the Virgin Mary from 1664 to 1718.

Residents of Vernet meanwhile referred to the place as a cursed 'village of the damned' because of its links with disaster. 

In March 2015, Vernet was also cordoned off following a horrific air crash in which 150 people died, including two babies.

Germanwings Airbus A320 was deliberately brought down by co-pilot Andres Lubitz, who had previously been treated for suicidal tendencies.

Many Vernet residents took part in high mountain searches for possible survivors at the time. They also opened their homes to family and friends of those who perished in the disaster.

The inhabitants of Vernet were also shaken by the murder of a local café manager in the village 15 years ago. Jeannette Grosos, who ran the Café du Moulin, was brutally killed by a customer in 2008.