A 26-year-old French police officer, Éric G., has been imprisoned for 15 months in pre-trial detention for shooting an illegal Algerian migrant to death after the man broke into his 94-year-old grandmother’s garage in Bobigny in Seine-Saint-Denis, one of the most multicultural neighborhoods in Paris.
All of Éric G.’s requests to be released from pre-trial detention have been systematically denied — rejected a total of seven times. The officer’s lawyer indicates that the officer is being persecuted by the judge because he is a White man who shot an Algerian.
“Basically, it was a blond man with blue eyes who shot an Algerian,” said Éric G.’s lawyer, Laurent-Franck Lienard.
Remarkably, the case has not even gone to trial, well over a year after the officer shot the Algerian man to death. However, the officer remains incarcerated in extreme conditions.
The officer’s lawyer dismissed the court’s main argument for continued detention—the risk of recurrence—as nonsensical:
“The main argument [for continued detention] is the risk of recurrence. As if he were going to find himself tomorrow morning in his grandmother’s garden with his service weapon, in front of another squatter. It makes no sense,” Lienard stated. He also rejected the hypothesis of his client pressuring the civil party, denouncing the situation as “a profound injustice” rooted in political bias.
On Saturday, June 29, 2024, police officer Éric G., a 26-year-old, shot and killed Slimani, who had previous arrests on his record, including for illegal cigarette sales.
Éric G. maintains he was acting in self-defense.
The sequence of events began around 6:00 a.m. when Éric’s mother alerted him to suspicious noises at his elderly grandmother’s house, following an incident from the day before in which someone was trying to force open the garage door.
Éric G. was off-duty at the time of this incident. He said he took his service weapon and went to the house. He said that he believed his grandmother might be prone to hallucinations, which is why he did not want to call emergency services right away.
In a report written by Éric G. after the incident, he described the situation when he first arrived.
“Arriving at his home, I put on my police armband, climbed over the fence, and headed towards the garage, the area that had been damaged and squatted the day before,” reads the report.
The garage, a small outbuilding, contained the individual, Amar Slimani, visibly asleep.
Éric, who was off-duty but wearing his police armband, contacted 17 (the police emergency number) after confirming the man’s presence. He stated, “I announced my position, told him he was being arrested for trespassing, and told him to stay calm, with which he initially seemed to cooperate,” in his report. While on the phone, the situation escalated.
According to Éric, the suspect became increasingly hostile. The man “became increasingly uncooperative and ended up confronting me in a very provocative and threatening manner.” Éric drew his telescopic baton, issuing a final warning:
“I gave him my final order, pointing with my left hand toward the back of the garage. And brandishing the telescopic baton in my right hand, I told him in a strong and firm tone to move away and back off.”
The police officer claims that after a brief stare-down, Slimani grabbed what he mistook for a metal sledgehammer, later identified as a caulking gun, and armed himself.
“He had won the balance of power,” Éric stated in his report.
Fearing for his life, Éric said that he tried to flee but realized he was cornered, as the man was chasing him:
“I immediately made the decision to flee toward the street. During this escape, I realized he was chasing me and that I could no longer escape.”
Éric drew his service firearm, turned, and fired seven times, hitting Slimani five times. The victim died shortly after, despite Éric’s attempt to administer first aid.
In his report, Éric described his immediate actions: “My priority is to help him. I place his body in the lateral safety position and take his pulse: I feel movement. […] I try as best I can to apply what I was taught in police school and during continuing training regarding self-defense. I think the individual is alive but unconscious. I call 17 again to request medical assistance and to be guided. I am still alone.”
Prosecutor initially recommended not to prosecute
Éric G. was immediately placed in police custody and subsequently in pretrial detention, against the initial advice of the prosecutor’s office. Fifteen months later, despite guarantees for his release, including offers of employment and housing outside the department, every request has been rejected.
His mother, Michelle, expressed her despair: “He needed people to welcome him outside the department and a promise of employment. Well, there are two families waiting for him and two employers ready to put him to work!” she swore.
She questioned the severity of his detention: “Why don’t they let him go out with an electronic bracelet? Why are they treating him as if he were the worst serial killer?”
She added: “My son shot to avoid dying, not to kill! What’s the point of persecuting him like this?”
National Rally backs officer
The Algerian’s family is claiming that the Algerian man, who broke into the grandmother’s garage, is the victim of a “racist crime.”
Clearly, the case has become political, with the National Rally backing the officer. Yassine Bouzrou, the lawyer for Amar Slimani’s relatives, confirmed this reality, saying, “We believe it more than ever, now that we know the family has the support of the National Rally.”
The psychological assessment of Éric G. is now being used against him. The report claims he is “rigid” psychologically and expressed little sympathy for the Algerian man.
The lawyer for the Algerian is also going on the attack, saying that continued pretrial detention is “the least we can do.”
The laywer claims that the putty gun did not represent a weapon and that the seven shots fired by the officer showed his determination to kill the Algerian. He said Éric G.’s version of events featured “numerous lies” and is “completely contrary to the truth.” He said that Slimani may have simply been an illegal worker doing “odd jobs” for the grandmother. The officer’s lawyers vehemently deny this claim, saying that the man had no tools when he was found at the scene.
Furthermore, Éric G.’s family completely denies this claim. The officer’s mother said her family has now been destroyed and that it appears their son is the victim of revenge.
“I recognize that their family is destroyed, but what’s the point of destroying ours now? Is this revenge?” the mother asked.
Éric G.’s mother further confirmed her son is struggling in prison. In French prisons, police officers are targets and must be kept in extreme isolation.
“He has dark thoughts, it breaks my heart. He told me that if we weren’t there, he would have hanged himself already,” said Éric G.’s mother.
As for Éric G.’s grandmother, she passed away months ago. She was never told her grandson was incarcerated. This measure was taken by the family to “spare her” the pain, according to the officer’s lawyer, Lienard.
The post French Police Officer Rotting in Prison for 15 Months After Shooting Algerian Migrant Who Broke Into His Grandmother’s Garage appeared first on American Renaissance.
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