A resident of the 10th arrondissement of Marseille died Tuesday after being hit by a stray bullet on Sunday. Lawyer Karima Meziene, member of the “Collectif desfamilies”, once again calls for “general states” to act on the causes of this violence in the neighborhoods.
All the daily lives of residents of difficult neighborhoods “is conditioned to a survival mechanism”, explained Tuesday September 12 on franceinfo Karima Meziene, lawyer, member of the “Collectif desfamilies” after losing her brother in a shooting in 2016. Marseille has been the scene of numerous settling of scores linked to drug trafficking in recent months. A man was shot dead Monday evening in the north of the city and a young woman died Tuesday in Marseille, after receiving a stray bullet while she was at her home. “The residents of the neighborhoods live in a climate of fear”explained the lawyer.
franceinfo: Do consumers have some form of responsibility?
Karima Meziene: Of course there is a responsibility of consumers, it is obvious, since in any case, if there were no demand for narcotic products, there would be no offer in this sense. It’s a disease. But I’m not sure that the repressive side can prevail. If we have to act at the consumer level, it will be more through a health prevention campaign.
Is the repressive component alone not enough?
In any case, we must not act exclusively on the repressive aspect, even if it is an important aspect. We were the first, with our collective of victims’ families, to demand a strengthening of the judicial police and a strengthening of investigating magistrates to be able to lead to the incarceration of the murderers.
Now, this is not the only battle that must be fought. We must act on the basis of violence. We must reconquer these neighborhoods. Above all, we must provide more public services, more proximity, and supervise these young people to ensure that they do not go to these networks.
Does the government seem to understand the problem?
I have the feeling that there may be a change today, a start or an awakening. There is a clear desire from all the players in the field that I meet to move towards this. I hope that today we will be able to move forward and discuss. This morning I heard a police unionist who said that the response could not only be repressive and that it was necessary to organize general meetings. We have been asking for them for a long time.
“I remain convinced that if we are not all together around the table and if we do not all act together, whether it is the police, the justice system, the actors on the ground, the families who have been affected by this type tragedy, we will not find a solution to remedy this problem.”
Karima Meziene, lawyer, member of the “Collectif desfamilies”at franceinfo
Could the death of this young woman killed by a stray bullet while she was at home be an electric shock?
I don’t know if that will be enough to raise collective awareness. There was already a ten-year-old child who was affected, a grandfather, a mother… The residents of the neighborhoods live in a climate of fear. They are perfectly aware of this reality. They know perfectly well that today they can be hit by stray bullets while moving.
They have protective reflexes that we do not have, simple inhabitant living in a peaceful neighborhood. They already have these automatisms. Their entire daily life is conditioned by a survival mechanism. They tell me: “I don’t come home too late at night, I avoid going to such and such a place.” They are fully aware that they can take stray bullets at any time.