the trial opens in Paris on Monday

It was six years ago, an evening of July 14 in Nice (Alpes-Maritimes). While hundreds of families are watching the fireworks, a truck pulls onto the Promenade des Anglais and rushes into the crowd. The attack left 86 dead and more than 450 injured. Monday, September 5 afternoon, the trial of this night of horror opens before the special assize court of Paris. To allow civil parties to follow the proceedings, an exceptional organization has been set up in Nice. Two retransmission rooms are installed in the Acropolis Palace. A trial that starts in less than an hour in Paris, without the perpetrator, but where eight people will be tried. “In the absence of the assailant, killed by the police on July 14, 2016, a total of eight people are on trial”explains Éric Pelletier, live from the Paris courthouse.

“First, a small group of friends. They are three friends of Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, aged 27 to 46. They are a tiler, a hotel receptionist and a criminal for one of them. They are not not suspected of complicity but of association of criminals in connection with a terrorist enterprise. And then there are five other people, suspected of having provided weapons, in particular an automatic pistol, without having ever met the terrorist. An absent author, no structured Islamist commando and a claim deemed opportunistic by the investigating judges. This trial risks causing a lot of frustration among the 900 civil parties”concludes Éric Pelletier.