At the specially composed Court of Assizes of Paris,
“My testimony will necessarily be technical, we are responsible for restoring order and reason where the disaster has sown terror. “For nearly two hours, the policewoman who testifies this Wednesday at the bar of the specially composed Assize Court of Paris methodically unfolds her presentation. In July 2016, Commissioner Elvire Arrighi, 41, was posted to the technical and scientific police sub-directorate, where she headed the unit responsible for identifying disaster victims. His team carried out, in a few days, a titanic job to put “a name to each lifeless body” found on the Promenade des Anglais, in Nice, after the attack committed by Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel.
“As soon as we were informed by the media of the current events, I asked all members of the unit to return to duty”, says in her soft voice the policewoman, blond hair, ponytail, dark suit. After having been requisitioned by the Sdat – the anti-terrorist sub-directorate of the judicial police – his unit, made up of 132 specialists, reached the Côte d’Azur. When they arrived, around 6 am on July 15, the DIPJ agents from Marseille were still making observations at the scene of the attack. On a sheet, the police note the place where the bodies – or body parts – were found, specify whether objects allowing their identification were found, such as a telephone or an identity card.
“The children were identified first”
Gradually, the deceased are taken to the forensic institute of the city, where part of his team has settled. “They worked day and night, in rotation, to carry out physical examinations”, continues the commissioner. Inside, the bodies are installed on three tables. Around them, three members of the unit examine them, while a fourth notes their observations. We take their fingerprints, we take a little DNA, we describe their distinctive signs, the way they are dressed… Their personal effects are put aside, while other specialists will analyze and photograph their teeth.
All these elements are then compared to those communicated by the families who are waiting to know if their loved ones have died or been hospitalized in serious condition, without their having been able to be informed. We bring photos, toothbrushes… It is a commission which, later, will confirm the identity of people found. “The children were identified first,” says the commissioner who, until then, manages to control his emotion. In all, “88 people and 10 body parts are identified in less than five days,” she said, adding that it took twice as long to do the same work after the November 13 attacks.
Police officers “shattered by what they have experienced”
“Each story is unique and moving,” says Elvire Arrighi. We have not forgotten any face. Her presentation takes another turn when she evokes the case of the Copelands, an American family on vacation in France, whom she received personally, being the only one on her team, at that time, to speak English. Facing her, a woman who has lost her husband and Brodie, 11, her only son. The widow is accompanied by the two children that her husband had from a previous union. She describes to the policewoman the mole under her husband’s right eye, his dimples. “He died trying to save his son when he saw the truck smash into it. »
The mother then describes her little boy, his 137 cm, his 32 kg, his red T-shirt with three buttons, his freckles under his eyes, his black sneakers. She then sends him “the most recent photos of her child, to help identify him”. They were taken “a few minutes before the attack”, when the boy was eating sweets and seemed happy. The commissioner’s voice then betrayed her emotion. Little Brodie is the first victim of the attack to have been identified. His mother, brother and sister were able to see him at the forensic institute on July 17. Every summer, Elvire Arrighi thinks of the Copeland family, “but especially of Brodie’s smile”. She knows she is not the only one to have been scarred by the days following the attack. “Each of the staff engaged on this mission was overwhelmed by what they experienced. »