Since the tragedy that occurred three years ago, Ilias Akoudad, accused of the murder of brigadier Éric Masson, has denied the facts with which he was accused.
“Yes, it was me who shot the policeman.” These words are those of Ilias Akoudad, main suspect in the case of the murder of police officer Éric Masson, 36, killed by two bullets on May 5, 2021 in the city center of Avignon, on a deal point where he was intervening . Three years after the tragedy, the man who is currently being tried before the Vaucluse Assize Court and who until then had always denied the facts with which he was accused, and even up to his presence on the scene, according to Le Figaro, is finally confessed.
Confessions which were expected, in addition of course to being hoped for by the victim’s relatives, while for a week and the start of the trial, affirms La Dépêche, the hearings were increasingly overwhelming for Ilias Akoudad. However, the 22-year-old young man assured that he was unaware of the police status of the individual he shot. “I never had the knowledge of the status of police officer. I would have known it, we would have continued on our way,” he said during the hearing this Monday, February 26, as reported by Midi Libre.
Explaining that when he arrived at rue du Râteau, “we informed him that there were people who were going to see the customers to serve them”, and that this is why he would have rushed on site, Ilias Akoudad returned to the facts. He said that Éric Masson understood very well that he did not know that he was a police officer. “When I asked if he was coaling, he laughed and said come on,” he recalled. After approaching the police officer, Ilias Akoudad said he asked him what he had to sell.
There, Éric Masson would have shown him a bag seized from a buyer. The police officer would have asked him what he would give him. “I said 10 euros and then he said: ‘Wait!’ I put my hand in the bag, took out the gun and explained the situation to him, that it [was] a deal point, that he [had] no business selling here and to go elsewhere,” detailed Ilias Akoudad, relays Midi libre. Faced with the weapon, Éric Masson would still not have declined his profession, the accused further assured.
If Ilias Akoudad confessed, it was above all because it “hurt him to see Mr. Masson’s family like that”, he said. The young man, who faces life imprisonment, spoke on Monday while his mother was questioned at the bar. As Le Figaro points out, Ilias Akoudad will in turn be questioned on Wednesday. The opportunity, without a doubt, to return to his new version of the facts.
