He had so far remained silent. From a police station in the 19th arrondissement of Paris, the Minister of the Interior spoke on Thursday July 27 in the early evening, before receiving the police unions Place Beauvau. In the midst of a protest movement by the police linked to the imprisonment, in Marseille, of one of them, suspected of having beaten a young man, Gérald Darmanin assured that they “do not claim impunity nor “to be above the law”, and said he understood their “anger” and “sadness”.
“They saw that political parties were talking about the police killing; we insult them, we vilify them, and add to this fatigue an emotion, anger, and for many of them (…) a sadness of these trials of intent, of these media trials”, he said. added, in front of the prefect of police of Paris, Laurent Nuñez, and the director general of the national police (DGPN), Frédéric Veaux.
Since the controversial remarks of Mr. Veaux – he had felt that a police officer had no place in prison – Gérald Darmanin had remained silent, notwithstanding the context of protest among police officers, following the imprisonment of one of their colleagues. “I fully support him, and I am very proud that he is my collaborator,” the interior minister said of the DGPN.
“A profession that is in extreme pain”
At the end of an hour-long meeting in the evening between Mr. Darmanin and the union representatives, the latter judged that the minister had been “rather attentive” and that he had “undertaken to have food for thought on the pre-trial detention of police officers”.
“He does not see any inconvenience in any case to work on article 144 of the code of criminal procedure which is pre-trial detention so that we put a clause and that in particular the police are excluded from this device, in the exercise of their mission, of course”, assured Fabien Vanhemelryck, Secretary General of Alliance.
The Unit-SGP-Police-FO union also calls for the creation of a specific status for the police officer under investigation, which excludes the provisional detention of an agent acting on mission.
For trade unionist Anthony Caillé (CGT-Interior-Police), on the other hand, “having exceptional justice for the police is not understandable, it is not acceptable”, “it would be serious in a republic, in a democracy”.
“On the other hand, it is a profession that is in extreme pain. We only have to see it on the sick leave rate and the suicide rate in our profession, which is extremely high. But by dint of asking the police to do only repressive, punitive missions, that is not tenable, ”noted Anthony Caillé Thursday on Franceinfo.
The statements of the DGPN, from an interview published Sunday by Le Parisien and which had received the approval of the cabinet of the minister, triggered an outcry among the magistrates and in the political class.
A movement that affects “less than 5%” of agents, according to Darmanin
Police officers have entered a phase of protest, putting themselves in “code 562”; some are even on sick leave. The movement is difficult to quantify, but the unions assure that it is gaining momentum everywhere in France. “Less than 5%” of agents participate in the movement, tempered Gérald Darmanin Thursday evening.
“We are in the midst of a crisis”, confided earlier, to Agence France-Presse (AFP), Linda Kebbab, national secretary of the Unity-SGP-Police-FO union, who specifies that it is “not a question of ‘a movement of defiance vis-à-vis the minister’.
“I think [Gérald Darmanin] is aware that the results in the services are impacted and that it is not sporadic. It’s quite unprecedented. In 2018, we had a call to “code 562″ [the expression designates the minimum service, which consists of responding exclusively to emergency calls received by 17, the emergency police number] at the start of the crisis of ” yellow vests”, but it had not been very followed. There, the police more easily find legitimacy in the movement, ”she says.
Sharp drop in activity in certain sectors
In Seine-Saint-Denis, one of the poorest and criminogenic departments in the country, the number of night guards is around fifteen compared to 35 to 70 usually. “It’s been a long time since we’ve seen this in Seine-Saint-Denis,” Bobigny prosecutor Eric Mathais told AFP. Ditto in Marseille where the number of referrals is “historically low”, or “70-75% less activity”, according to a local judicial source. And in Paris, this volume was halved in the duty section of the prosecution.
The protest came from Marseille, a week after the incarceration of a police officer from the anti-crime brigade (BAC) suspected of having beaten a 21-year-old man, with three other colleagues, on the night of July 1 to 2. . The victim, Hedi, had explained in La Provence to have been beaten, after having received an LBD shot in the temple. The facts would have occurred during the riots which ignited the country, following the death of Nahel M., killed on June 27 in Nanterre by a police officer during a road check.
Frédéric Veaux then came to support the police by speaking in Le Parisien. Paris police chief Laurent Nuñez said on Twitter (renamed “X” this week) that he shared his comments. These two highest executives of the French police were then the only ones to speak. On the move in New Caledonia, the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, refused to comment on the remarks of the boss of the police. He said, however, on Monday, to understand the “emotion” of the police, before letting go: “No one in the Republic is above the law”.
