(Saint-Denis) A young man from Saint-Denis, north of Paris, died on Saturday from injuries three days after a teenager was stabbed to death there in the metro, testifying to a climate of tension in this popular suburb, one of the main venues for the Olympic Games.
These two violent deaths occur against a backdrop of clashes between young people from different neighborhoods for several days in the town of 113,000 inhabitants.
“We learn with shock and great sadness of the death of Farid, a high school student who was violently attacked last Wednesday near his school,” the municipality said in a press release on Saturday.
His attack, with baseball bats according to a police source, took place Wednesday morning a few hours before the death of a 14-year-old boy, named Sedan, stabbed to death on the metro platform.
Farid A., 18, was standing in front of his high school “when a car stopped [sa] height for an operation akin to a punitive expedition,” reported the municipality.
“The attack was fleeting, cold, blind and extremely violent with the use of blunt objects. The attackers left their victim on the ground,” she described.
Seriously injured, the young man was placed in an artificial coma.
His death coincided with the gathering of several hundred people on Saturday morning in front of the town hall of Saint-Denis in memory of Sedan.
This demonstration, in the presence of many local elected officials, was the occasion for vibrant calls for calm and a refusal of violence.
The motive for Sedan’s murder – a 19-year-old young man was taken into custody – remains to be clarified at this stage.
Tensions in the city have led to a strengthening of the police force and the ban on gatherings until Monday. The authorities also asked parents of students to keep their children at home during the weekend.
Once again on Friday, “attempted altercations” took place again in the city, some of them in the name of “revenge”, which led to around twenty preventive arrests by the police, according to the socialist mayor Mathieu Hanotin.
In December, a deputy mayor was violently attacked and beaten by two strangers, sparking a wave of indignation.
The city, where the Stade de France is located, will host several events of the 2024 Olympic Games, notably swimming, as well as a large part of the Olympic village which, according to the municipality, will then be converted into a residential and entertainment district. activities.