Police have arrested a male suspect after a cardboard box, with a severed head inside it, was thrown out of an apartment s window in broad daylight.

On 1 February RAID, the elite team of French national police, was alerted to a location in central Toulon where a gruesome crime took place. The arriving officers found a severed human head in a cardboard box that had been thrown out of an apartment s window.

According to regional news outlet Nice-Matin, the officers of police s anti-crime brigade BAC spotted a man at the window with blood on his hand and made an immediate arrest. Information obtained by France Bleu Provence suggests that the suspect now in custody is a 40-year-old former military officer who is getting a divorce. Police then broke down the entrance door of the flat and handcuffed an unarmed man inside, apparently the owner, who happened to be alone. Preliminary police reports suggest that authorities are not treating the crime as an act of terrorism. The victim is a 56-year-old man, whose identity remains unknown. The motives of the murder are unclear, but the suspect, who kept repeating the word Satan during his arrest, is said to be struggling with mental health issues.

Toulon Mayor Hubert Falco took to Twitter to express his gratitude to the city s law enforcement units for apprehending the suspected killer.

The area was cordoned off for the duration of the police action, in which no officers were injured.