A French tax inspector has been killed during an audit at the home of a dealer in second-hand goods, reports BBC News.
Officers found the victim with multiple stab wounds and his female colleague bound to a chair at the property in the small northern village of Bullecourt.
The dealer's body was found in an outlying building. Officials say he shot himself.
The prosecutor said the murder appeared to have been premeditated, as metal clamps were found on the premises.
The man had no previous convictions but had committed "acts of violence against minors", prosecutor Sylvain Barbier Sainte Marie added.
The 46-year-old businessman collected items from private homes and car-boot sales to resell them at the farm he owned, according to Éric Bianchin, the mayor of Bullecourt, a village of 250 people south-east of Arras.