a man dies after receiving around ten taser shocks during his arrest

A 30-year-old man died on Friday January 5 in the morning at the Paris hospital where he was admitted on Thursday, after receiving a dozen shocks from an electric pulse gun during his arrest by the police in Montfermeil (Seine-Saint -Denis), AFP learned from the Bobigny prosecutor’s office. According to the first elements of the investigation cited by the prosecution, six police officers used their electric pulse pistol.

There were 18 officials who intervened in a grocery store in Montfermeil, Thursday shortly after midnight, to question this man, in “state of overexcitement” And “aggressiveness», According to the same source. Born in Martinique on January 1, 1994, the man had been hospitalized in Paris in a coma since the arrest. The autopsy will be carried out on Monday. This will determine the exact causes of death and the link between death and the electric shock gun discharges, according to the prosecution.

According to the account of a police source, the manager of the grocery store appealed to the police so that the officials could remove this employee who refused to leave the premises, in order to be able to close his business. At the scene, the man was alone in the grocery store, consuming alcohol. According to his colleagues, he had become violent in recent days. The police had to intervene for violence on his part with a bladed weapon. In the business, two police officers from a crew of the anti-crime brigade, according to their version, tried to reason with him at length, without success. Attempts by colleagues and the man’s mother were also unsuccessful in the face of his virulence.

In the afternoon, he contacted his mother saying “I’m not well, we got into my head“. When the police approached him, he held out his arm. Fearing that he would grab their service weapon, they used the electric pulse gun, but without succeeding in handcuffing him. The situation degenerated, one of the police officers was violently bitten on the finger and kicked in the face. They then called for reinforcements, according to the same police source.

Two ongoing investigations

According to the prosecution, six officials, out of the 18 who intervened, used their electric impulse gun (PIE, which projects prods connected to the weapon by lines). Around 12 discharges were fired according to the first elements of the investigation, without producing an immediate effect.

According to a source close to the case, he suffered two cardio-respiratory arrests, before being hospitalized in a coma. According to the prosecution, a cardiac arrest was noted while the man was in the fire brigade van who had taken care of him, after the arrest, during the night from Wednesday to Thursday.

The investigation into their intervention was entrusted to the IGPN (general inspectorate of the national police). The police officers have not yet been interviewed and the examination of the video surveillance is underway. A second investigation which targeted the man into the violence and death threats against civil servants was entrusted to the Seine-Saint-Denis Territorial Security.