Three men sentenced to 25 years in prison after the lynching of two police officers in 2020 in Val-d’Oise

The accused did not name the perpetrator of the ten shots, two of which hit the legs of a police officer and four the body of his colleague. The lawyer for one of the accused said he would appeal.

Without being able to determine the perpetrator of the shooting, the court applied a uniform sanction. Three young men who violently attacked two police officers in Herblay (Val-d’Oise) in 2020 were sentenced to 25 years in prison by the Val-d’Oise Assize Court on Friday, December 1.

“It was a decision that was expected by my clients and by the entire police force”, reacted Me Pierre Salem-Cormier, lawyer for one of the victims. The sentences are slightly lower than the requisitions of the general advocate who had requested 30 years of criminal imprisonment with two-thirds security against the accused, who “felt authorized to massacre police officers”.

Ten bullets fired

The facts occurred on the evening of October 7, 2020, when the two officers of the Cergy judicial police went in civilian clothes and an unmarked car to an industrial zone in Herblay. The three accused claimed to take them for members of the Traveler community posing as police officers, despite the evidence shown by the officials (professional card, weapon).

Then a violent fight broke out, the attackers seized a police officer’s weapon and fired ten bullets, two into the legs of a police officer and four into the body of his colleague. “I will never understand why we suffered such an outburst of violence”, “my life was shattered”modestly declared the police major, injured in the legs.

But none of the three accused named the perpetrator of the shooting. One of them argued in court that “Those who tell the truth (…) are very unwelcome in prison.” For one of the lawyers, Me Yann Le Bras, this verdict is “terrible, for the accused but also for the civil parties who do not have the judicial truth about the identity of the shooter”.

The major, the only police officer to remember the facts, affirmed that one of the three accused had uttered the sentence “take their guns and shoot these dirty cops”, something that the latter has always denied. Saïd Harir, his lawyer, indicated that he would appeal. “All the investigation showed that he had not participated in the violence and the shooting”he underlined, recalling that his client had surrendered two days after the events, unlike the two others who spent five months on the run.