the man suspected of having fired has been arrested

The man suspected of shooting a GIGN gendarme, killed during an operation against illegal gold panning, on March 25 in Guyana, was arrested on Saturday April 8, announced the public prosecutor of Cayenne. The man, aged 20 and of Brazilian nationality, was arrested in the Guyanese forest, after having announced his intention to surrender, said prosecutor Yves Le Clair.

The suspect was placed in judicial detention, before his appearance before the judge of freedoms and detention (JLD), who should place him under a warrant of committal. According to the first elements of the investigation, this man belonged to a group of robbers of clandestine gold mines, and was not himself a gold digger.

undercover operation

GIGN policeman Arnaud Blanc, 35, was killed while taking part in an operation against illegal gold panning on the clandestine site of Dorlin, in the heart of Guyana, not far from Maripasoula.

Accompanied by two other GIGN gendarmes, four army soldiers and a nurse, he “has been dropped by helicopter in the forest in order to carry out an undercover operation for more than two days to reach a logistics base” miners, the gendarmerie had specified.

The group was taken to task by an armed band. After exchanges of heavy fire, the gendarme, gendarmerie non-commissioned officer of the GIGN Cayenne branch since 2019, had been hit by a bullet. An investigation had been opened by the Cayenne prosecution for murder in an organized gang.