His state of health was not conducive to his continued custody. Suspected of having violently attacked a 74-year-old priest on Saturday morning in downtown Nancy, a 38-year-old man was hospitalized in a psychiatric facility.
After being examined by an expert, the man saw his police custody lifted. However, the latter will resume when the suspect’s state of health allows it, Nancy prosecutor François Capin-Dulhoste said on Sunday.
The defendant had been placed in police custody for acts of violence aggravated by three circumstances – drunkenness, weapon and religion of the victim – by the police officers of the Nancy police station, François Capin-Dulhoste told AFP.
“All Catholics are pedophiles”
The priest, 74 years old according to the prosecution (the prefecture of Meurthe-et-Moselle had initially mentioned 75 years), was dressed in his cassock when he left his home on Saturday around 7 a.m. He then “crossed a 38-year-old man in a street in old Nancy who addressed him in these terms: ”All Catholics are pedophiles””, explains the magistrate. Remarks clearly referring to recent scandals of pedocrime in the Church.
The man then ran towards the priest and struck him “a violent blow on the back of the head with a chandelier he was holding”, said François Capin-Dulhoste. A direct witness of the facts also declared that the defendant, drunk, carried “multiple kicks” in the head of the victim, who fell to the ground, reports the magistrate. The attacker, who had fled, was “arrested very quickly” by the police.
The state of health of the “reassuring” priest
The priest, who lost consciousness during the attack, was taken care of by the emergency services and taken to the emergency room. His total incapacity for work is not fixed at this time, said François Capin-Dulhoste.
On Saturday, the secretary general of the prefecture of Meurthe-et-Moselle, Julien Le Goff, told AFP that the victim’s state of health was “reassuring” at the end of the day. “The priest did not know his attacker. We have confidence in justice and let it do its job”, reacted for its part the diocese of Nancy and Toul in a press release.