It’s a Prévert-style inventory with a very bitter taste. Sunday evening, in Marseille, Socayna, 24, was hit in the head by a stray bullet while she was in her room, sitting at her desk. The student was the victim of a Kalashnikov shot fired indiscriminately at the foot of her building, known to be a deal point. The next day, in Estaque, a 56-year-old man was shot dead by two men on scooters armed with an assault rifle. Tuesday, just a few kilometers from the Marseille city, a man was found burned in the trunk of his car. A “signature” murder of the settling of scores.
Since the start of the year, at least 43 people have been killed in Marseille, at least three of whom are collateral victims of these score-settling against a backdrop of drug trafficking. To this must be added 109 injured. This is significantly more than in previous years. According to the Marseille prosecutor’s office, in 2022, 32 people lost their lives in similar circumstances, and 25 in 2021. This record, however, surprised no one. In April, Dominique Laurens, the public prosecutor of Marseille, even predicted it, expressing her concern about a “particularly worrying dynamic”. How can we explain what is currently happening? Some answers with Blast journalist Xavier Monnier, author of The New Godfathers of Marseille (ed. Fayard, 2016) and a fine connoisseur of the Marseille city.
Since the start of the year, at least 43 people have died in Marseille in shootings, compared to 32 last year. How can we explain this increase despite the police reinforcements in recent months?
It is quite difficult to hear, but it must be understood that police activity creates the conditions for these settling of scores. From the moment we “hit” the networks, that is to say we question people, we dismantle deal points, mechanically, other clans will try to take back their share. There are also more cyclical elements: a release from prison, a vendetta, a conflict between two clans…
Recently, Frédérique Camilleri, police chief of Bouches-du-Rhône, estimated that around 80% of these settling of scores are linked to the city of La Paternelle, in which two clans clash…
At La Paternelle, in fact, there are two concomitant factors: many operations carried out by the police and two gangs fighting over the area. This is not the first time that two clans have clashed violently.
We had this a few years ago in Fontvert or Les Tilleuls. Each time, there were many deaths. And you have to realize that these clans hold other cities, it spreads everywhere in the city.
Last April, the public prosecutor of Marseille, Dominique Laurens, estimated that “this particularly worrying dynamic” would continue in the months to come. Do you share his analysis?
Of course. What we are witnessing is a cup that has been allowed to fill for years and which, today, is too full.
Score settling is nothing new in Marseille. Far from there. But for years, particularly under the era of the former mayor, Jean-Claude Gaudin, there was a bit of this idea that as long as they killed each other and it remained in the northern neighborhoods, it was not not so serious. The problem is that there are working-class neighborhoods everywhere in the city and that, inevitably, at one point, this violence boils over.
Two years ago, the “Marseille en grand” plan was launched, investments intended for education, housing, transport, etc.
This is only the beginning, we’ll have to wait and see what happens. In any case, the situation will not change overnight. The traffic was not built from scratch, there was a breeding ground for it to prosper. For years, the state was completely disengaged from these neighborhoods.
The Father, for example, for a long time, was relatively quiet. These are not large bars like at Castellane or Fontvert, but rather small buildings. The police academy was right behind it, it was quiet. Then she moved and the situation was allowed to deteriorate. Today, we are paying the consequences of all these years of doing nothing.
At the same time, the police presence has continued to increase…
Police repression is necessary – we cannot let killers go free – but it cannot be enough, we see this on a daily basis. The question is: is total repression the right method?
Since we lost the war, let’s organize the market. This is the whole subject of the decriminalization and legalization of certain drugs. In Portugal, since they took this path, there is much less violent score-settling. But this is not the path the government seems to want to take.
What do you think of the term “narchomicide” used by the prosecutor to describe the situation in the city?
We also talk about the “Mexicanization” of Marseille. Actually, there is no need to cross the Atlantic to talk about the effects of crime, look at what is happening in Rotterdam or Antwerp. Personally, I don’t like this term very much but it reflects a reality, that is to say people who are killed because of drug trafficking. Some take part. Others don’t, or in a totally ridiculous way. When 14 or 15 year old kids are killed, we suspect that they are not network leaders.
How can we explain this rejuvenation of the victims?
It started in the 2010s, and it has continued to grow ever since. Why, everywhere in the world, do traffickers – whoever they may be – use children or young people? Because we are less suspicious of them, we pay them less, they risk less from a legal point of view and there are many of them so they are replaceable. They are playing more and more with small hands. However, in a trade war, it is these little hands that clink glasses. The leaders of these clans have mostly left Marseille and live abroad. In Dubai, Morocco, the Emirates…
Seine-Saint-Denis, which is a relatively comparable territory – a young population, pockets of poverty and a hub of the drug market – has “only” twenty homicides since the start of the year . How do you explain this Marseille specificity?
I am not a specialist in Seine-Saint-Denis, there are probably several factors which explain this but we can assume that the market is more structured, stabilized. When this is the case, there is a form of control where everyone remains on guard. And Marseille is at the traffic crossroads, close to Spain and Italy. There is a long tradition of clans renewing themselves.
Do you feel that the population is fed up with this situation?
In Sicily in the 1980s there were huge protests against the mafia. They brought together thousands of people, the images were very impressive. In Marseille, when there are white marches, there are at most 100 or 200 hundred people.
There is a form of resilience towards these settling of scores, but not resistance. This shows to what extent this city is balkanized, what happens in one district does not concern the other. There is no unity or solidarity on this issue.