The excuse of “fatigue” will not have been enough to convince the police of the police. The General Inspectorate of the National Police (IGPN) will “propose sanctions” against the police officers of the Brav-M (Brigade for the repression of motorized violent actions) who made threatening and humiliating remarks towards demonstrators arrested during a procession savage against the pension reform in March, its director said on Thursday.
“I confirm to you that we are going to propose sanctions to the prefect of police”, declared on France Info Agnès Thibault-Lecuivre, the director of the IGPN, adding that she was “about” to submit her conclusions. She said she was “extremely shocked” by the comments of the police, revealed in an audio recording obtained by The world and the website Loopsider.
“Even though (…) these are police officers who were at the end of a particularly complex session, in a context of restoring tense order, that in no way authorizes behavior contrary to the exemplarity, which must be expected in all circumstances,” said the director. At the end of March, a few days after the revelation of this recording, the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, had affirmed that there would “obviously” be sanctions against the police.
59 judicial investigations since January
On the night of March 20 to 21, members of Brav-M arrested seven young demonstrators, suspected of having taken part in degradations in a wild procession in the center of Paris. One of the arrested had then discreetly recorded the exchanges with the police.
“The next time we come, you won’t get on the bus to go to the police station, you’ll get on another thing called an ambulance to go to the hospital”, can we hear in the recording. Two sounds of slapping are also audible, before one of the police officers launches: “You are starting to stutter! Do you re-want maybe one, that I give you the right jaw? »
In reports to their hierarchy of Brav-M agents who intervened on the evening of the facts, obtained by AFP, they pleaded “physical and moral fatigue”. A brigadier thus describes “shifts of 14 hours, even 16 hours” during which “our basic and vital needs were not respected, hydrating and eating were very complicated”. Agnès Thibault-Lecuivre also indicated that the IGPN had been seized of “59 judicial inquiries” since the first day of mobilization against the pension reform, in January.