Two men have been charged with murder as part of a criminal gang after a 27-year-old bride was shot dead at a wedding party in southeastern France, prosecutors said.

Gunmen opened fire last Sunday at a wedding celebration in Goult, a hilltop village overlooking lavender fields, in what sources said might have been drug-related score settling.

Four masked men shot at several guests, including the newlyweds and the bride’s 13-year-old nephew, in a car park outside the village hall, Marseille prosecutor Nicolas Bessone said late Thursday.

“The assailants opened fire, fatally wounding the bride, who was hit several times near the carotid artery,” Bessone said.

“The shots also hit the groom, who had several wounds in the upper body,” he said, adding that the boy had a lung injury and was initially in critical condition.

The groom’s sister was also hit in the shoulder.

One of the attackers was killed. He was “shot in the back and head” and also “hit by a vehicle during the attack,” said the prosecutor.

A pedestrian walks in a street of the town where a fatal shooting took place during a wedding party in Goult, in the southern French department of Vaucluse, on June 22, 2025. GABRIEL BOUYS/AFP via Getty Images

His three accomplices fled on foot. Two of them were detained in a nearby town several hours later and the fourth is on the run.

Le Figaro reported that the suspects were also linked to a second shooting the same day in the nearby city of Avignon, where a man was shot dead and another injured near a shopping center.

After 96 hours in police custody, the two suspects appeared before a magistrate on Thursday and were charged with murder and attempted murder as part of an organized gang. They have been remanded in custody.

The Marseille public prosecutor did not specify their motives. But a source close to the case said the 25-year-old groom was known to police for drug and organized crime offenses.

The violence might be linked to possible drug-related score-settling, said another source.

As of 2022, Goult had a population of just over 1,000 people. The village is located in southeast France, about 50 miles north of Marseille, a port city that has been shaken by drug-related killings in recent years.

The French government has recently vowed to intensify the fight against narcotics and drug-related crime.

Mystery surrounds the death of 19-year-old twin brothers who were found shot to death on a Georgia mountain just 24 hours after missing their flight to Boston — with their family now disputing investigators’ murder-suicide theory.

Twin 19-year-old brothers were found shot to death on top of a Georgia mountain a day after missing a flight to Boston to visit friends — and their family is refusing to accept probers’ murder-suicide theory.

Qaadir and Naazir Lewis of Lawrenceville disappeared March 7 after missing their 7 a.m. flight, with the teens found dead by a hiker the next day at the summit of Bell Mountain near the North Carolina border.

The bodies of 19-year-old twins Qaadir and Nazir Lewis were found on a Georgia mountain top earlier this month. 11Alive

The twins were set to travel to Boston together March 7, the day before their bodies were found. gofundme

Grieving uncle Rahim Brawner said the teens were inseparable and would never hurt each other, even as the Georgia Bureau of Investigations is treating the case as a murder-suicide.

“They’re very protective of each other. They love each other,” Brawner told local WXIA-TV on Friday of the brothers. “I couldn’t imagine them hurting each other because I’ve never seen them get into a fistfight before.”

The twins’ family insists the brothers had a large support group and would never hurt each other. 11Alive

The brothers’ aunt, Yasmin Brawner, said the teens also had a “huge support system” who they knew would have have helped them if there were signs of trouble or suicidal tendencies.

“We know them. They wouldn’t do anything like this,” Yasmine told the outlet. “To say they did this to each other? No. Something happened in those mountains, and we want answers.”

The aunt has since started a GoFundMe to help pay for her nephews’ funeral expenses. She noted that the twins had “dreams of starting their very own clothing line” in the future.”

The family said it has yet to hear answers on how Qaadir and Naazir traveled from the airport to Bell Mountain, saying the teens have never been there, nor are they known to hike.

The twins had plans to start their own clothing line, their aunt said. Yasmine Brawner/Facebook

The brothers’ bodies were found by a hiker around 11:05 a.m. March 8, with gunshot wounds on both their corpses.

Their family said the brothers were found with their plane tickets still inside their wallets.

The teens were found by a hiker at the summit of Georgia’s Bell Mountain. Google Earth

The GBI said autopsies for the brothers have been completed but that officials are still waiting for additional forensic tests before issuing a final ruling on the cause of death.

Authorities did not name the brother they believe carried out the murder-suicide.