Marseille is cleaning up its municipal police force. The town hall announced on Tuesday the suspension of eight agents from it and its “urban supervision center” (CSU), which controls public highway surveillance cameras, after revelations of possible violence or breaches.
The town hall opened an administrative investigation in May after the broadcast on BFMTV of images of municipal police officers hitting a man who appears drunk after an altercation, before the surveillance camera was turned away from the scene.
A service weapon left on the corner of the table
A CSU operator, on arrest and who claims to be the victim of harassment since he reported these actions, dating back to February 2023, then admitted to being at the origin of the dissemination of the images.
Saturday, the regional daily Provence had made new revelations based on the testimony and recordings made by this agent, Sébastien Florenti. One recording notably seems to indicate that the camera movement during the February 2023 incident was voluntary, others contain inappropriate comments about people filmed by video surveillance. The agent also describes a service weapon left on the corner of the table, or even watching series instead of public highway surveillance screens. The police management, for its part, evokes in the press the resentment of this agent, who twice failed to become a municipal police officer and is said to be embittered.
On Monday, the various left municipality indicated that “the administrative investigation launched by the City for the purposes of establishing the facts and characterizing the stated faults made it possible to identify seven agents and led to the following decisions: the seven agents are immediately suspended, pending the holding of a Disciplinary Council. The City of Marseille files a complaint against these seven agents so that justice can take the action it deems appropriate.
One of the lawyers is surprised by the “change of heart of the town hall”
The town hall indicates “also refer the matter to the public prosecutor against the agent responsible for the dissemination of videos and recordings made outside any legal framework”, who is also “suspended as a precautionary measure”. , the time of the investigation”.
Me Victor Gioia, lawyer for Sébastien Florenti, was surprised by “a change of heart from the town hall which, after forcefully denying the evidence, hastily made a decision which is incomprehensible and totally unfair” concerning his client, who, according to him “in this affair the role of whistleblower”. He estimated that the other sanctions, against four municipal police officers and three CSU agents, “target lamp workers”.