The three police officers placed in police custody after shooting at a car during a check on Saturday in the 18th arrondissement of Paris came out free on Tuesday, June 7. These officials – two men and a woman – had been questioned by the general police inspectorate since Sunday. Two of them fired nine shots at the vehicle, which they claim the driver tried to run into them. The passenger, seriously hit in the head by police fire, died on Sunday evening. The driver was seriously injured. Two investigations are open: one for attempted homicide on the police, entrusted to the judicial police and the other led by the IGPN.
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The police of the police were seized because of the seriousness of the consequences of their shootings, specifies the parquet floor of Paris. The IGPN seeks to know if the police were in a state of self-defense. The 38-year-old driver of the vehicle suspected of having run into the police patrol on an ATV, does not have a driver’s license. The two rear passengers explained that he had precisely refused to stop because of this lack of permit. The police, themselves, assure that he wanted to rush them. One of the officials was also slightly injured.
In which cases can the police shoot?
This case comes a month and a half after that of Pont-Neuf, where a police officer was indicted for intentional homicide. He had fired on a vehicle and killed the driver as well as the front passenger, again as part of a refusal to comply. Facts that once again question the methods of the police. Does this type of traffic offense justify the use by officials of their weapon? Under what circumstances are they authorized to open fire?
Since 2017, as with the gendarmes, the police can shoot at a vehicle when a driver does not comply and when it is likely to harm their life or that of others. A new framework defined in article 435-1 of the Internal Security Code, created after the publication of the law on public security of February 28, 2017. For the Pont-Neuf case, at this stage of the investigation , self-defense was not retained, the policeman being indicted for intentional homicide. For the case of the 18th arrondissement, it will be necessary to wait for the end of police custody to find out if charges will be brought against the police.
Has the law changed?
According to Fabien Jobard, research director at the CNRS, interviewed on Tuesday on franceinfo, this new law of 2017 is “came to confuse very clear texts” on self-defense. Historically, recalls the researcher, the use of the weapon had to be “absolutely necessary, strictly necessary and absolutely proportional to the dangers involved”. DSince the application of this law, he adds, the shootings of the police and gendarmes have increased by 50%, as revealed by an internal note from the IGPN.
LIVE – Police control in Paris: is the self-defense of the police clear? ➡️ “No”, replies Fabien Jobard. “This law came to confuse clear texts. Immediately afterwards, the number of police shootings increases considerably.” pic.twitter.com/AwHbgJG2nC
— franceinfo (@franceinfo) June 7, 2022
Refusals to comply represent the main reason for which the police use their service weapons. In 2020, this represented for example 60% of their shots, according to the IGPN. Police unions, for their part, ensure that officials in the field face a refusal to comply “every 20 minutes”.
In reality, this frequency is that of the total number of offenses impeding the control of the police, published by Road Safety (approximately 30,000 per year). These offenses include refusals to comply, but also refusals to blow into the breathalyzer or hit-and-runs. If we only take into account refusals to comply, there were 13,000 in 2020 according to a Senate report. That’s one every 41 minutes, a figure up 28% in five years, according to the same report.
What are politicians saying?
The intervention of the three civil servants on Saturday in Paris resulting in the death of a passenger took a political turn, illustrated by a pass of arms between Jean-Luc Mélenchon and Gérald Darmanin. “The police kill! And the factious group Alliance, the police union, justifies the shooting and the death of the driver for ‘refusal to comply’. When is the shame?”, questioned on Twitter, Saturday June 4, the leader of La France insoumise. Words he said he did not regret, Tuesday on France Inter.
“I have never been anti-cops”, assures @JLMelenchon“I am against a disproportionate use of violence, state violence is legitimate because it is proportionate”. #le79Inter pic.twitter.com/9XnmdoP91L
– France Inter (@franceinter) June 7, 2022
Gérald Darmanin, meanwhile, replied that the police and gendarmes deserved respect and that insulting them dishonors those who want to govern. “Let the investigations be done without using them as hostages of an electoral campaign”added the Minister of the Interior.
Also invited to react to the words of the leader of La France insoumise on franceinfo on Tuesday, Marine Le Pen castigated a “systematically anti-police ideology” by Jean-Luc Melenchon. “He is always on the side of thugs, criminals, never on the side of law enforcement”launched the formerpresidential candidate of the National Rally, who recalled his proposal for a “presumption of self-defense” for the police.