The night of “rare violence”: rioting against a 17-year-old man killed by a police officer in Nanterre

In Nanterre, on Tuesday, this concern turned out to be a matter of life and death. Nahel M., a 17-year-old male of Moroccan and Algeria descent, was fatally shot by a police officer at a traffic stop as he was walking down the street. Protests erupted in style over the past few nights. In Toulouse and Lille, for example, groups of protesters broke windows at police stations and set fireworks on public buildings. Over 1000 people have been arrested.

President Emmanuel Macron planned to leave an EU summit in Brussels, where France plays a major role in European policymaking, to return to Paris and hold an emergency security meeting Friday.

Around 200 police officers were injured, according to a national police spokesperson. There was no information about injuries in the rest of the population.

Schools, town halls and police stations were targeted by people setting fires, and police used tear gas, water cannons and dispersion grenades against rioters, the spokesperson said.

Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin on Friday denounced what he called a night of “rare violence.” His office said that the arrests were a sharp increase on previous operations as part of a government effort to be “very firm” with rioters.

Towards a solution of the problem of ‘police brutality’ in a French rioting area after the shooting of two boys in 2005

The government has stopped short of declaring a state of emergency — a measure taken to quell weeks of rioting around France that followed the accidental death of two boys fleeing police in 2005.

A police officer was taken into custody after the shooting — and on Thursday, prosecutor Pascal Prache announced a preliminary charge of voluntary homicide against the officer, saying that a review found the legal standard for the officer to use his gun had not been met when he fired at Nahel from close range.

A lawyer for a arrested police officer said he was sorry and “terrible” on a French TV channel. The officer did what he thought was necessary in the moment, his lawyer told the news outlet.

“He doesn’t get up in the morning to kill people,” Lienard said of the officer, whose name has not been released as per French practice in criminal cases. “He really didn’t want to kill.”

“What they are trying to do is seize this moment as an opportunity to open a wider debate about what they see as systemic police abuse, particularly in the working-class suburbs,” reporter Rebecca Rosman told NPR from Paris. There are many complaints of police brutality and discrimination against minorities in these areas.

“We have to go beyond saying that things need to calm down,” said Dominique Sopo, head of the campaign group SOS Racisme. We have a police force that uses racist terms against people, such as Blacks and Arabs, in order to keep them out of the police force.

A riot in Nanterre, France, follows a fatal shooting by a police officer at close range near the Nelson Mandela Square

In Nanterre, a peaceful march Thursday afternoon in honor of Nahel was followed by escalating confrontations, with smoke billowing from cars and garbage bins set ablaze.

The curfew was put in place in Clamart, which is located in Paris’ southwest suburbs and is home to 54,000 people. In the town of Neuilly-sur-Marne, a curfew was announced.

Nahel was shot at close range by a police officer during a traffic stop near Nelson Mandela Square on Tuesday morning.

The officer who acknowledged firing his weapon said he did so because he was afraid of being hit by a car and that he wanted to stop the vehicle.

The scenes in France’s suburbs echoed 2005, when the deaths of 15-year-old Bouna Traoré and 17-year-old Zyed Benna led to three weeks of riots, exposing anger and resentment in neglected housing projects. The boys were electrocuted after hiding from police in a power substation in Clichy-sous-Bois.

Deadly use of firearms is less common in France than in the United States, though several people have died or been wounded by French police in recent years, prompting demands for more accountability. Protests were also held in France after George Floyd’s death.

13 people were killed by police last year when they didn’t comply with traffic stops. Nahel is the third person to die in similar circumstances this year.

French North African boy killed in 2020 by a Minneapolis cop: Why do we care if the cops are America’s? “It’s a tragedy,” France 24, wrote Fleming

Citing France’s history of colonial and racist behavior toward Arabs and Black people, Fleming added, “So it really matters that this boy who was killed was North African — French North African.”

Unrest over the killing of Nahel, whose family has Algerian roots, is “about something much bigger,” she said, adding, “In any society, the policing that we see, and discrimination that takes place, reflects the biases of that society and that society’s history.”

There is a reality that this is not inexplicable. It’s not rocket science, it’s racism,” said Fleming, the author of Resurrecting Slavery: Racial Legacies and White Supremacy in France.

Critics say that leaders are showing sympathy, but they don’t want to know the root of the problems that led to Nahel’s death.

The killing of Nahel by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020 has resulted in protests and unrest, in the same way that the death of George Floyd by a Minnesota police officer in 2020 led to widespread unrest.

“You are going to get a bullet in the head,” a voice is heard saying, according to the France24 news outlet. A single shot is heard when the car moves closer to the road. Nahel died in the crash, his car came to a stop after hitting the pole.

Two other people were in the car with Nahel — one has spoken to police, but the other fled the scene and was being sought by law enforcement, Jarry said.

The two officers tried to stop the car after they saw it go through bus lanes, but it sped away, according to the prosecutor’s office. The car’s driver didn’t stop until he was cut off by a traffic jam, the prosecutor said.

Green party leader Marine Tondelier said the police are becoming like America’s after hearing conflicting versions of events.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2023/06/30/1185394143/france-teen-police-shooting-protests-nahel

The killing of a 17-year-old pedestrian as a self-defense exercise in protests against a gunman killed by a police officer

The chant heard repeatedly is, “Justice pour Nahel,” but while the protest center around the teenager’s tragic death, demonstrators’ demands go further.

From the mayor to the president, authorities expressed their condolences and support for Nahel’s family this week, along with a pledge to hold police accountable. More and more, leaders are trying to control the crowds and prevent damage as protests intensify.

Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin sent a letter thanking the emergency personnel for their restraint.

Jarry and others asked protesters not to damage the buildings used by residents. Two schools have been targeted, he said, and a leisure center and cultural center have been badly damaged or destroyed.

Djigui, one of the thousands of protesters who took to the streets on Thursday afternoon in a suburb of Paris, told me that his mother was still nervous when he left the house. “I can hear the crack in her voice when she checks to make sure I have my ID card or just says, ‘Watch out.’”

Still, the killing of Nahel M. might have ended up as little more than a secondary news item. Police officers shooting an erratic driver to stop him from escaping their custody was portrayed by the press as self-defense. The officers were protected by a law that loosened police restrictions on the use of firearms in cases where they are needed to stop a driver who refuses to stop. (This law has been cited as one cause of an uptick of fatal police shootings in recent years, which have risen to a peak of 52 deaths in 2021 from 27 in 2017.)

Hundreds of people gathered in the western suburb of Nanterre to pay their last respects to Nahel M., a seventeen year old who was shot and killed by a police officer after being stopped for a traffic violation.

Dozens of mediators, who act as liaisons between the community and local officials, were hired to keep order and stop anyone from filming or taking photos. The mosque was so full that at one point some 300 people crowded into the street for the public prayer of mourning.

The destruction and safety of Nahel’s mother, Catherine, in the city of Nanterre, France, during the last few years

“Try and put yourself in the place of this boy’s mother,” pleaded Catherine, a Nanterre resident who didn’t want to give her last name out of concern for her safety. “I just can’t imagine … He could have been any of our children.

Some said they were disappointed by several politicians on the right and far-right, who they felt had seized on the moment to try to tarnish the boy’s image.

“It feels like Nahel was killed twice, like I’ve been there many times,” said a community activist who’s been a staple of the area for decades. “First, with a bullet, then a second time with a smear to his reputation.”

Despite a morning cleanup of the city, displays of the destruction were still on display. The streets were adorned with layers of melted plastic and the remnants of many cars that had been burnt to a crisp.

The French government has increased the number of police across the country to maintain order as the country braces for more unrest.

Young people were urged to stay at home by the government. The average age of those arrested on Thursday was 17, according to France’s interior minister, Gérald Darmanin.