A police officer has been indicted as part of an investigation into accusations of police violence that occurred on the nights of the riots, after Nahel’s death. He was placed under judicial supervision.
A fourth police officer was placed under judicial supervision on Thursday, August 31, as part of an investigation into violence committed on the sidelines of the Marseille riots in early July. Pascal G., a police officer with the interdepartmental public transport security services (SISTC), is suspected of having abused Otman, a 36-year-old man, on the night of July 1 to 2. The investigation is being carried out by the General Inspectorate of the National Police (IGPN).
According to the investigation, Pascal G. hit Otman in the head with a baton as he was leaving a looted tobacco shop in the Plaine district. Otman suffered facial fractures. The police officer was arrested Tuesday morning and taken into custody. He was brought before the investigating judge on Wednesday afternoon, then placed under judicial supervision, but without a ban on practicing. The charges for this indictment are “aggravated violence”, “threat or act of intimidation to persuade a victim not to file a complaint” and “abuse of authority by a person responsible for public order to thwart the execution of the law”, according to the Marseille prosecutor’s office.
With Franceinfo, Otman had testified to his violent arrest: “I thought I was going to be arrested because I had done something stupid. But that’s not what happened to me. It looks like they wanted to take justice into their own hands. When I got out of the tobacco, I took a direct blow from the truncheon on the head. I was smashed on the ground. I felt blows, then black hole. When I woke up, I felt I was handcuffed and my face was sliding to the ground. Actually it was blood. I have a cracked jaw, they knocked out at least four teeth, I have seven stitches in the skull, the cheekbone depressed.” Following this arrest, no charges were brought against Otman.
Provence claims that the policeman was confronted by the IGPN with a sound recording. In this file, the 60-year-old threatens Otman with “reprisals” if he decides “to lodge a complaint against him”. But this attempt to intimidate the police officer failed since the victim decided to file a complaint in mid-July. This audio could weigh heavily in the balance for the offending police officer.
Otman told Franceinfo to feel relieved at the judicial progress, but he maintains that five officials and not only one assaulted him during this arrest. These facts took place the same night as the death of Mohamed Bendriss after being hit by an LBD shot, the blinding of his cousin Abdelkarim Y. after an LBD shot and the violent attack suffered by Hedi seriously shot in the head . Marseille concentrates a large part of the IGPN’s investigations following the nights of riots which followed the death of Nahel in Nanterre.
