While the whole country is still reeling from the tragedy experienced by Lindsay, the schoolgirl from Vendin-le-Vieil who ended her life to escape the daily school harassment she suffered, a new case has shaken the region. In a video posted on social networks, Shana, a student at Marie-Curie College in Tourcoing, is abused by several young girls. Difficult images that maintain a collective emotion that is already white-hot. But what do we really know about this story?
The bomb is dropped
The video appeared for the first time on Facebook, last Friday, posted by a certain Marvin Lengrand, a self-proclaimed whistleblower resident of Tourcoing. “I got these videos from a friend of my sister and I was waiting for her green light to publish them,” he explains to 20 minutes. These three short films, compiled into one video, show several people, young girls, attacking another young girl very violently on the public highway. According to Marvin Lengrand, the victim’s name is Shana, she is 13 years old and attends Marie-Curie College in Tourcoing.
The video was quickly picked up on other social networks, including Twitter and TikTok, and went viral. The word “school harassment” is immediately associated with these attacks and Internet users, the whistleblower first, are indignant at the inaction of the college management and the authorities. Two rallies were also organized in front of the establishment to demand sanctions against the alleged harassers whose names, first names and photos were published on the networks.
An investigation is underway
Three days after the publication of the video, the Lille prosecutor’s office, requested by 20 minutes says investigations are ongoing. “On May 29, several videos were broadcast on the social network Twitter showing acts of violence in a meeting committed against a young girl near the Marie Curie college in Tourcoing”, summarizes the prosecutor of Lille, Carole Etienne. “An investigation was immediately opened for violence in meetings committed near a school and entrusted to the minors brigade of Tourcoing”, she continues.
Investigations which made it possible, at first, to formally identify the victim. Without revealing her identity, the prosecution confirms that she was heard by the police on May 30. In addition, on Wednesday, the prosecution could not advance further on the identity of the suspects of the attacks: “the investigation is continuing in order to identify the respondents”, declared Carole Etienne.
For its part, in a message sent to the parents of students, the management of the establishment described as “defamatory” the remarks accusing it of “allowing harassment to be perpetrated against a young girl from the college”. On Wednesday, in a press release, the Lille academy affirms that the college teams were informed of a “conflict between two students” which occurred “before the spring holidays”, adding that the families of the students concerned had been “immediately notified”. .
School harassment or settling scores?
Anyway, this does not change the seriousness of the facts revealed in the video. It is nevertheless a question of making the share of the things. If the social network court has already given its opinion, the judicial and administrative parties are tempered. On the one hand, the prosecution evokes for the moment “violence” without using the term “harassment” and relies on the investigation to “delimit very exactly the circumstances of the facts”.
On the National Education side, the Lille academy does not speak either of school harassment but “of a conflict that arose within the establishment, between two students and their respective siblings”. On the facts, the Academy recognizes that the college had been informed by students “of a possible altercation at the exit of the establishment” on May 22, ensuring that “the police forces have been warned”.
The students will go to the disciplinary council
A date that the prosecution confirms as corresponding to part of the facts filmed. But the prosecutor also mentions a much earlier date, April 6, for another part of the facts shown on video. This could correspond to the “act of violence” recognized by the Academy which led to “a meeting with the family”.
If rumors on the networks claim that the two main suspects were arrested and placed in police custody on Wednesday, the Lille prosecutor’s office does not confirm this information. For its part, the college will conduct two disciplinary councils, one for undated acts of violence and another for those exposed on video. This advice should lead to “adequate sanctions”.