It has been a year since this so-called new strategy was implemented by the Bouches-du-Rhône police headquarters. This Tuesday, during a press briefing, Frédérique Camilleri drew up an initial assessment of the “shelling” of deal points in Marseille, a new mantra from the authorities to fight against drug trafficking in the Marseille city, at the origin of 16 settling of accounts in 2021 in the second city of France. What is that ? What are its effects ? 20 minutes make the point.
What is this “shelling” strategy?
Since the arrival of Frédérique Camilleri at the head of the Bouches-du-Rhône police headquarters, the police have been instructed to regularly attack so-called visible traffic, on public roads, in housing estates. Marseilles. All in order to destabilize the networks that hold the 150 networks that Marseille is home to. “It’s about ridding the public space of traffickers’ deal points,” says Frédérique Camilleri. The shelling strategy consists in hitting in a massive and repeated way on the most problematic places to crumble the points of deals and the networks of traffickers. »
The police intervene daily in the cities accompanied by CRS units, at the rate of three to six daily two-hour operations, during which they carry out arrests and seize goods. “The CRS, I could have used them to secure the city center, assumes Frédérique Camilleri. I could have used them even more massively to maintain order. I sometimes choose to manage demonstrations that I think are peaceful with local resources from the DDSP to preserve the CRS so that they can go to the housing estates. »
And to add: “The shelling operations are often associated with operations to restore the living environment. These operations have made it possible to remove 1,000 tonnes of bulky items in one year, which are often used as barricades, either in stairwells or at the entrance to housing estates. This also made it possible to remove 1,000 wrecked vehicles which serve as a cache for traffickers, and to erase 1,300 m² of tags being incentives to consume or signs indicating deal points. »
Is it effective?
“This shelling strategy works very well for small and medium-intensity deal points, which have almost disappeared like in Soda,” says the police chief. The effect on the most flourishing deal points, and therefore, often, those which arouse the most covetousness and settling of scores, is however not as drastic. Thus, according to the prefect of police, the shelling of the Campagne-Lévêque network, in the 15th arrondissement, had the effect of slowing down the activity of this narcotics point, whose turnover fell from 50,000 euros daily to 8,000 euro.
“The northern division of Marseille seized a million euros and a ton of cannabis resin only thanks to these small daily operations,” argues Frédérique Camilleri. A way also to create dead losses within the networks. The prefect of police also highlights the statistical effects of this strategy, with, for example, 1,273 drug trafficking cases carried out by the departmental directorate of public security in Marseille in 2021, an increase of 60% compared to to 2019.
However, it is impossible to know if these arrests are followed by rapid convictions by the Marseille prosecutor’s office. Asked about this subject, the prefect of police kicks in touch. During a recent press briefing, the Marseille public prosecutor’s office reported “deep unease linked to the structural inadequacy of its resources. “Recently, a hearing for a drug trafficking case which was to be held before the Marseilles court, was canceled on the grounds that it was being tried fifteen years after the start of the investigation.
What about network heads?
The people arrested during these shelling operations called “from below” almost exclusively affect the small hands of the network, in particular the lookouts, recruited more and more on social networks throughout France, from Saint-Etienne to Clermont-Ferrand , and subject to high turnover, by the authorities’ own admission. It remains to get hold of the network bosses, who often live abroad.
“We tried, this year, to carry out much more research towards priority targets of drug traffickers”, claims Eric Arella, territorial director of the judicial police of Marseille. Thus, in 2021, seven people, suspected of being at the head of several Marseille narcotics points, were arrested in Dubai, Morocco or even Colombia.