According to a police source, the attacker is Armand Rajabpour-Miyandoab, a Frenchman born in 1997 in Neuilly-sur-Seine in Hauts-de-Seine. This man with a “very unstable profile, very easily influenced”, according to a security source, had already been arrested in 2016 by the General Directorate of Internal Security (DGSI) for a planned violent action in La Défense. He was sentenced to five years in prison and was released after four years of detention.
Since 2020, he has lived with his parents in Essonne and is being monitored for significant psychiatric disorders, “even neurological disorders”, according to Gérald Darmanin. He had stopped taking his treatment, said a security source. On Saturday, a protest video was posted on social networks alongside his action. It talks about current events, the government and the murder of innocent Muslims.