Nancy. The possible terrorist escapes from Lunéville and ends up in prison

Baptiste G. holds his head in his hands. He looks overwhelmed. Or to be bored to death. Or maybe both. This 41-year-old inhabitant of Lunéville is, this Monday, in the box of the court of Nancy.

The president is reading him his record. It’s long and a bit hopeless. The quadra has indeed the trifle of 39 convictions to its judicial record. We find everything. Flights. Lots of stups. Quite a few threats and outrages. And above all three disturbing sentences for the defense of terrorism.

The last sent him to prison for two and a half years. The 40-year-old who converted to Islam and radicalized left last November. He went to live with his mother in Lunéville. He was free without being.

–

One night in Nancy

Given his profile as a possible jihadist, he was, in fact, the subject of a control and surveillance measure by the Ministry of the Interior. In particular, he was forbidden to leave Lunéville and the obligation to check in every day at the police station at 9 a.m.

But this Sunday, he did not show up to the police in Lunéville. His mother called at the end of the morning explaining that he had not got up because of the change to daylight saving time. Then she explained that her son was stranded in Nancy and that he did not have a train to return.

The police managed to reach Baptiste G. on his cell phone. He replied that he was at a friend’s house in the vicinity of Lunéville and that he was going to take a taxi to come check in. In the end, he was arrested outside his mother’s house as he got out of a taxi.

–

Admission to the bar

At the helm, he maintains against wind, tide and evidence that he did not spend the evening in Nancy but next to Lunéville with a mysterious friend named Samantha. “Your explanations are far from convincing,” sighs President Gastaldi, who reminds the defendant that his phone was limited to Nancy.

Long silence in the box. ” Well. That is true. I stayed the evening in Nancy ”, ends by confessing Baptiste G. His confession stops there. During the days and the previous weeks, his telephone also limited everywhere in the agglomeration in Nancy but also on the side of Metz and Thionville. But he denies this journey as surprising as it is disturbing: “I had left my phone to friends of Laxou”.

–

“He has expressed his intention to go to jihad”

We won’t know more. Not enough to reassure the deputy prosecutor, Mariana Caballero who insists on the dangerous profile of the accused: “He has repeatedly shown his intention to go and wage jihad”. And to require 10 months in prison.

“It’s excessive! We do not judge a terrorist. My client is perhaps dangerous but it is not at all a certainty ”, pleads Me Doniphan Losa. Judgment: 8 months in prison.

–