New suspicions of police brutality in France led this Tuesday to the arrest of five officers of a French elite unit for the death of a 27-year-old man, in Marseille (south), on the sidelines of the riots in early July.
Mohamed Bendriss, shot dead on the night of July 1 to 2 in Marseilles (France’s second largest city), is so far the only fatal victim of this episode of urban violence, which took several days after the attack in several French cities. erupted. death of young Nahel.
Nahel was killed by a police officer in late June during a “stop operation” in Nanterre, on the outskirts of Paris.
A month later, the French prosecutor deemed it “probable” that the young man’s death was “caused by a violent shock to the chest caused by the firing of a ‘Flash-Ball’ type projectile”, another designation for Defensive Bullet Launcher, or LBD.
The Public Prosecutor’s Office in Marseille said it had summoned other police officers to “be heard as witnesses”.
In early July, as the center of Marseille was ravaged by vandalism and looting in protest of Nahel’s death, 27-year-old Mohamed Bendriss died after a fall while riding a motorcycle.
And it was during the autopsy of the body of this man, married, father of one child and whose widow is expecting a second child, that traces of what could have been the impact of an LBD were found on his chest.
On July 4, a judicial investigation was opened for “fatal blows with a weapon” and entrusted to the French judicial police, as well as to the General Inspectorate of the National Police (IGPN), the police.
“Mohamed’s family hopes that the police will be identified and prosecuted,” Arié Alimi, lawyer for Bendriss’ wife, told France-Presse news agency (AFP).
To date, little information had been released about Mohamed Bendriss’ death, as the case was overshadowed by another that occurred on the same night of the riots, that of Hedi, in which police are also suspected of violence.
The 22-year-old was also shot in the head with an LBD and was beaten in Marseille, requiring part of his skull to be removed.
On 21 July, four police officers from the Anti-Crime Brigade of Marseille were indicted as part of this trial, sparking an uprising in some police stations, with the officers taking sick leave or doing only minimal duty.
Last Tuesday, French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin discreetly visited a police station in Marseille to speak with officers.
A total of 31 investigations were opened by the IGPN police during the riots, a police source told AFP.
Source: DN
