According to the prosecutor, the security device was undersized on July 14, 2016 on the Promenade des Anglais. He asks the judges for new investigations.
“Failures, even a series of shortcomings likely to have directly contributed to the achievement” of the Nice attack. The words of the public prosecutor of Nice, Xavier Bonhomme, are unequivocal. He asks the judges investigating the flaws in the security system put in place for the festivities of July 14, 2016 on the Promenade des Anglais, to reclassify the facts as “manslaughter and manslaughter”according to the supplementary indictment of the prosecution that franceinfo was able to consult on Wednesday July 19, confirming information from the newspaper Le Parisien.
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Because the investigation into the July 14 attack continues. Last year, it was the terrorist aspect of the investigation that was tried before the special Assize Court of Paris, which then examined the course of events and tried eight people, among others, for association with terrorist criminals. . All had been sentenced to terms ranging from two to eighteen years in prison. But another investigation is still underway to try to understand how the attack itself could have occurred.
An undersized safety device
In 2017, an investigation was opened for “endangering the life of others by deliberate violation of a regulatory obligation of safety or prudence” after the complaint filed by several civil parties. They pointed to dysfunctions in the security organization of the 2016 National Day Prom-Party. 30,000 people were expected. That evening, a ram truck drove into the crowd on the Promenade des Anglais, killing 86 and injuring more than 400. In this investigation, therefore independent of the terrorist component, four people are placed under the status of assisted witness: Christian Estrosi, current mayor of Nice who held the position of first deputy in 2016, Philippe Pradal, mayor in 2016 and current deputy of the Alpes- Maritimes, as well as the former prefect of the Alpes-Maritimes and his former chief of staff.
Two months ago, Me Virginie Leroy, the lawyer for the Promenade des Anges association and several civil parties, had filed a request for deeds to requalify the facts. “For more than six years, the investigations carried out by the investigating magistrates revealed shortcomings, even a series of shortcomings likely to have directly contributed to the realization of the facts”, considers the Nice prosecutor in his supplementary indictment. Examination of the documents of the judicial information “and new elements communicated by the association Promenade des Anges” pushes the prosecutor to ask for the reclassification of the facts. According to him, the device was undersized on the evening of July 14.
For Xavier Bonhomme, “the shortcomings noted appear to be able to be more accurately assessed as falling under characterized faults of imprudence or negligence, likely to have exposed others to a risk of particular gravity”. He asks for investigations into “the reality of these new elements” which fall under the offenses of“homicides and unintentional injuries by clumsiness, recklessness, inattention, negligence or breach of an obligation of safety or prudence imposed by law”.
The public prosecutor of Nice also considers it important “to determine more precisely the nature of the security device” set up on the Promenade des Anglais on the evening of July 14, when the terrorist threat was known “or feared”and in particular the possibility of an attack on the ram vehicle.
A supplementary indictment “which meets the victims’ need for truth”
Xavier Bonhomme also responds to requests from Promenades des Anges and requires multiple acts of investigation such as the hearings of 60 national and municipal police officers, and crews stationed at certain crossroads in the city. Finally, he asks that the appendices to the IGPN report, the 2016 terrorist risk analysis report commissioned by the City of Nice, or the copy of all the video surveillance images from July 14, 2016 to Nice.
Contacted by franceinfo, Virginie Le Roy, the lawyer for the Promenade des Anges association, welcomes a supplementary indictment from the prosecutor “which responds to the victims’ need for truth”. She points “the glaring inadequacy of the logistical, material and human security resources deployed at the Prom-Party”. Virginie Le Roy awaits from the investigating judges “several additional acts of investigation, which should finally allow, more than seven years after the attack, to obtain precise and concrete answers, indictments and the holding of a now inevitable trial”.
It is now up to the three investigating judges to decide.