“A refusal to comply is three years in prison and a fine of 75,000 euros, not a bullet in the head”. The comments are from Marine Tondelier, the head of EELV, this Wednesday morning on Sud Radio. They could be those of the inhabitants of a district who are still very shocked and who find it difficult to express their emotions. “We walk on the head, slip between two puffs of cigarettes with his colleagues, a social worker from a neighborhood center. All the work we do all year for in the end, such a conflagration because of the police, ”he lets out with a sigh. The faces are marked, the voices muffled near the cars and garbage cans that blazed last night in Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine), as in other towns in Ile-de-France.
Yesterday Tuesday, Naël M., a 17-year-old young man died, shot dead by the police when he refused to comply during a traffic check. The facts took place between 8 a.m. and 8:30 a.m. near the RER station, Nanterre-Préfecture. The police officer involved was taken into custody. He claimed that the young man ran into them, which is why he allegedly opened fire. But a video circulating on social media undermines this version of the story. In the Vieux-Pont district, where the young delivery man lived, the specter of urban violence hovers. The area located in a popular city in the west of Paris caught fire at night, the young people opposing the some 350 police forces deployed in the department, who were trying to restore calm.
“The little one has nothing to do with it”
“The little one, he has nothing to do with it, shouts a neighborhood resident to journalists who came with their camera, to shoot a report on the scene this Wednesday morning. The media system, we know you, the first thing you throw out is that it was very well known to the police, but it never even served in police custody. A statement widely relayed by the lawyers of the family of Naël who affirmed Tuesday that “the family reserves the right to prosecute all the people who will invent non-existent mentions in the criminal record of the young man”. One of them Me Cambla, speaks of “non-subject”. “He had no criminal record. Point. »
“You are serious about arriving in our neighborhood when we usually never see you there, still challenges this resident of the neighborhood for twenty-five years. I never saw you for a report. And there, you show up? Serious ? Let the family meditate, you are not in a zoo where you would film animals”. His anger becomes fury when our colleague takes out his mobile phone. ” Answer you ? But you will distort everything! “.
Near the Les Gavroches neighborhood hall, on children’s games, Hassan and Badri, aged about ten, observe the scene and the comings and goings of another inhabitant, who is trying to evict any person who wants to film. “But, madam, why are you filming here?, he asks a passer-by who records the altercation two steps away. “If it gets out of hand, it’s better to have a video, right? she replies. “Ah well if there hadn’t been a video, the case would already have been closed for the little one, it’s true”, he admits, before joining his neighbor, still beside himself, who fumes. “Ah, he did well to take his mobile phone, comments Badri. Don’t film this. It’s too serious, ”adds his friend Hassan.
Tuesday afternoon, a few hours after the tragedy, the Nanterre prosecution affirmed to 20 minutes having opened two separate investigations in flagrante, one led by the Nanterre police station and the territorial security of 92 for “refusal to comply” and “attempted intentional homicide on a person holding public authority” and the other by the IGPN for “voluntary homicide by a person holding public authority”. Naël’s family lawyers filed a complaint this Wednesday morning for “false public writing” concerning the first testimony of the police.
“To say and repeat that it is the fault of the police”
Mélissa*, who walks her baby in the neighborhood, greets the two inhabitants opposed to the journalists and agrees to answer us once the corner of the street is turned. “It must be said and repeated that it is the fault of the police, that killing a 17-year-old child should no longer be possible in France, she breathes. But please change my name, I don’t want to be quoted”. In the almost deserted streets of the district, it is difficult to obtain more testimonies in front of the still smoking carcasses of the burnt cars. The Ministry of the Interior deplored Wednesday morning about twenty cars burned throughout the territory and promised 2,000 law enforcement officers mobilized Wednesday evening.
“We don’t have the impression that it happened a few streets from here, testifies a bank adviser from the city center. It is certain that the inhabitants of Nanterre feel concerned and support the family of the victim en masse. But such a conflagration is creepy. Politicians must take sides and punish the police to prevent Nanterre and other suburbs from flaming”. The young man’s mother called this Wednesday on TikTok for a white march in tribute to her deceased son, Thursday at 2 p.m., departing from the Hauts-de-Seine prefecture, where the tragedy took place. “It is a revolt for my son”.