Gérald Darmanin

Five Raid police officers were taken into custody on Tuesday in an investigation into the death of a 27-year-old man in Marseille in early July, on the sidelines of the riots. In addition, Gérald Darmanin went on Tuesday morning, discreetly, to a police station in Marseille, the city from which an angry movement of the police started after the incarceration of one of theirs, suspected of having seriously injured with an LBD, Hedi, a 22-year-old man, we learned from a police source.

Published on: 08/08/2023 – 16:19

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New suspicions of police violence in Marseille. Five police officers from the Raid, an elite unit, were taken into custody on Tuesday August 8 in an investigation into the death of a 27-year-old man on the sidelines of the riots in early July.

Died on the night of July 1 to 2 in Marseille, Mohamed Bendriss is the only death recorded to date on the sidelines of this episode of urban violence which broke out in several cities in France and over several days following the death of the young Nahel, killed by a policeman during a road check in Nanterre at the end of June.

The prosecution considered at the end of July “probable” that the death of this man was “caused by a violent shock to the chest caused by the firing of a ‘Flash-Ball’ type projectile” (another name for the LBD).

“These police custody intervene on rogatory commission of the investigating judge”, explained the parquet floor of Marseilles in a press release, adding that other police officers were also summoned to be “heard as witnesses”.

At the beginning of July, when the center of Marseille was in the grip of degradation and looting following the death of Nahel, Mohamed Bendriss, 27, had lost his life after becoming unwell while riding a scooter.

It was during the autopsy of the body of this married man, father of a child and whose widow is expecting a second child, that the trace of what could be the impact of a shooting from LBD (defense ball launcher).

“Deadly shots with weapon”

On July 4, a judicial investigation was opened for “fatal blows with a weapon” and entrusted to the judicial police and the General Inspectorate of the National Police (IGPN), the police force.

Some 200 people had gathered for a white march on July 6 at the Cité Air Bel, in Marseille, at the foot of the building where Mohamed’s widow lives. “Mohamed’s family is in the hope that the police will be identified and prosecuted,” Arie Alimi, lawyer for Mohamed Bendriss’s wife, told AFP.

“It is undeniable today that neither Abdelkarim (a young man with a blind eye in Marseille, editor’s note) nor Mohamed committed damage or violence which could justify these police crimes against them”, he added.

Gerald Darmanin in Marseille

Until now, few elements had filtered concerning the death of Mohamed Bendriss and his case had passed in the shadow of another case which occurred the same night on the sidelines of the riots, that of Hedi, where police officers are also suspected of violence.

After also receiving a shot from LBD, but at the level of the head, this 22-year-old young man had been beaten up in Marseille and part of his skull had to be amputated.

On July 21, four police officers from the Marseille anti-crime brigade were indicted on charges of “intentional violence resulting in total incapacity for work (ITT) for more than 8 days” aggravated by three circumstances in that they were ” committed in a meeting, with the use or threat of a weapon and by a person holding public authority in the exercise of their functions”.

Three had been placed under judicial supervision and one placed in pre-trial detention, where he is still after the rejection of his appeal in early August by the Aix-en-Provence Court of Appeal.

This pre-trial detention had triggered a sling in some police stations, police officers going on sick leave or performing only minimum service.

Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin also discreetly went to a police station in Marseille on Tuesday to discuss with officials, AFP learned from a police source. He congratulated the officials for a seizure of cannabis then, “informally” exchanged for an hour with about sixty police officers, according to this source.

A third case concerning a complaint against police officers is still under investigation in Marseille: Abdelkarim Y., 22, claims to be the victim of an LBD shot by Raid police officers on the night of June 30 to 1 July. Cousin of Mohamed Bendriss, he has lost the use of his eye and has “a very significant nose fracture”, according to Arié Alimi, who is also defending his case.

The prosecution has opened a preliminary investigation on the grounds of “intentional violence in a meeting resulting in mutilation or permanent disability by a person holding public authority and with a weapon”.

A total of 31 investigations by the IGPN, the police force, were opened during the riots, a police source told AFP.

With AFP

2023-08-08 16:31:59
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