Cops’ summer hunt for rioters
Riots: how police track down delinquents who escaped arrest
Le Figaro, August 17, 2023
Police investigators carried out a colossal task throughout July to track down 314 delinquents who had escaped arrest during the nights of violence.
As France suddenly tumbled into chaos during the riots following the death of Nahel, killed on June 27 after refusing to obey the law in Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine), the forces of law and order had to absorb a double shock. The first, filmed hour by hour, was a tsunami of violence that resulted in 3,800 arrests, made in real time and red-handed, across the country. The second, much less well known, was the result of an extraordinary judicial hunt, the details of which Le Figaro is able to reveal. As of July 31, no fewer than 314 additional rioters, thugs and arsonists had been arrested by the investigation departments of public security and the judicial police. The latter alone was entrusted with the task of carrying out just over 170 particularly sensitive investigations into the most serious acts.
From the very first days, the judicial authorities referred emblematic events to the judicial police, such as the destruction and arson of town halls, attacks on police stations, major looting, and even threats or attacks on elected representatives,” explains Frédéric Laissy, head of the national police force’s communications department. While public order measures were still being maintained at their maximum, the first arrests were made at home, often with the assistance of the BRI or Raid.”
On July 5, Lille’s urban police force, with the support of the Raid, arrested half a dozen thugs involved in the attack, carried out on the second evening of the riots, on the municipal police headquarters housing a supervision center. The assailants were identified by DNA found on Molotov cocktails. Five of them have been remanded in custody pending trial by the end of the month, while one of their accomplices is being actively sought. At the same time, after a lightning investigation, the Rhône police apprehended six of the criminals behind the arson attack on an apartment block in Saint-Fons on July 2. The fire had started in the garbage room before spreading to the upper floors and causing extensive damage to the adjoining supermarket. In this case, security officers were able to obtain visual evidence: the use of video-surveillance from a neighbouring shop enabled them to identify the first suspect on the basis of a characteristic outfit that matched that of a person stopped shortly beforehand by the municipal police. Once again, the suspected arsonists have been placed behind bars pending trial, while 62 evacuees are still hoping to be rehoused.
Across the country, as a result of their investigations, specialized intervention units raided dozens of homes at the crack of dawn, while the winds of destructive violence were still blowing. The extraordinary commitment of the plainclothes police and the targeted operations undoubtedly dampened the spirits in the heart of the neighborhoods, shattering any sense of impunity and contributing de facto to a global strategy for restoring order. “While the judicial process is sometimes seen as taking longer, it has to be said that the mobilization of investigative services has played a role both in deterring urban violence and in deterring it in the longer term, with arrests and incarcerations decided by the courts, which have been able to proceed on the basis of investigations”, assures the Direction générale of the national police.
In the field, in the face of the onslaught, it was time for a united front. The judicial police, which was heavily involved, benefited from the enormous investment of small investigation groups in the police stations of medium-sized towns that had also paid a heavy price in terms of damage. In Niort (Deux-Sèvres), for example, local police officers carried out a large number of neighborhood investigations and sifted through videotapes before launching a crackdown. Between July 3 and 12, they caught six members of a horde of young rioters who had laid waste to the city center, ambushing police, looting shops and burning vehicles on the night of June 30 to July 1.
Young “barbarians”
In Mons-en-Barœul (Nord), it was the men in black of the BRI (anti-gang) who went looking for 11 young “barbarians” who had broken into the town hall on June 29 at 12:30 a.m., before setting it ablaze, while three municipal workers were trapped on the premises. As on every occasion, the judicial police team pulled out all the stops to track down the thugs. Every clue was followed, resulting in the discovery of traces of blood belonging to one of the assailants, who had injured himself breaking a window, a fingerprint on a vehicle that had escaped the fire, and DNA on a mortar. The monitoring of social networks, where the most boastful had posted images of their “exploits”, had made it possible to direct suspicions towards certain individuals. “Thanks to the rigorous way in which the findings were made, despite the mass of clues found in the field, and to the strong mobilization of the laboratories to obtain rapid results, the contribution of the technical and scientific police was decisive”, says Frédéric Laissy before insisting: “Nothing was left to chance.”
The experts methodically sifted through stones, various projectiles, makeshift weapons found on the battlefields, bottles used for incendiary liquids and traces of blood. Even lighters and mortar cases left behind were subjected to analysis. According to our information, the National Scientific Police Service, based in Écully and with five laboratories, received 317 files, representing almost 1,800 samples for the most important and sensitive cases. Most of these analyses were carried out in the “biological” and “arson-explosion” sections. “In addition to these analyses for the most sensitive cases, a very large number of seizures were carried out on the basis of findings by local forensic science departments”, explains the DGPN, which reveals a total of “1,700 interventions in the field, which supplied the fifty or so local technical platforms mobilized to deal with several thousand objects”.
In addition to analyzing clues, social networks and videos – even though a thousand cameras were destroyed during the riots – investigators relied on local police officers’ knowledge of the local population, as well as geolocation. For example, a cell phone stolen from the interior of a firefighter vehicle in Vernon (Eure) on the first night of the riots was used to track down an offender and his four accomplices. As Gérald Darmanin revealed to the National Assembly’s Law Commission on July 19, the average age of those arrested is between 17 and 18. The youngest are aged 12, and two-thirds had no previous criminal record.
Anticipate
In all, dozens of rioters were remanded in custody, and numerous judicial reviews and summonses were issued. During searches, the police found the spoils of the looting (clothes, cartons of cigarettes, lottery tickets, etc.) and, incidentally, kilos of drugs. The long hunt, which began a month ago, is far from over, with investigators still awaiting analysis reports and watching for the return of fugitives who have fled abroad, notably to North Africa. While the Place Beauvau is flexing its muscles, the staffs are broadcasting the same watchword: “Every perpetrator of violence must face up to his or her responsibilities.” In a letter sent on August 2 to the Paris police prefect and the heads of the police and gendarmerie, the Minister of the Interior asked that “all necessary means be mobilized to follow up individuals and groups of individuals behind the violent actions during the riots”. “This point,” insists Gérald Darmanin, “must be one of your priorities throughout the coming months.”
Intelligence services are invited to “reinforce, as of now, their systems for anticipating this type of event”. The idea is to prevent any excesses in the run-up to the Rugby World Cup and the Paris Olympics, when the eyes of the entire planet will be riveted on France. The slightest misjudgment will be paid for in cash.
——-
via: sansnom
Translated by Act for freedom now!