The criminal track ruled out in 2019, the Paris prosecutor’s office believes that the conclusions will take several months.
Six years today, after the fire that ravaged Notre-Dame de Paris, the investigation is still not closed. If the Paris prosecutor’s office has already indicated that “Nothing was moving towards a voluntary fact”which excludes a malicious act but also from terrorism, it seems that it will still be necessary to wait several months before having final conclusions.
« A 3D modeling of the flame, filmed and photographed, is in progress, in order to determine the origin of the fire. This modeling will make it possible to be confronted with the different hypotheses that have been issued on the possible natures of the start of the fire ”, explained the prosecution in December. However, the exploitation of expertise will take “Still several months”.
The judicial information was opened against X on June 26, 2019, for “Involuntary degradations by fire by manifestly deliberate violation of an obligation of prudence or security”. All the companies present on the site on the day of the fire were then interviewed, in order to know if a cigarette megot had been left, or if a “hot spot” had not been forgotten by an employee.
Read too
Notre-Dame: Emmanuel Macron will honor 100 companions and employees who “are the pride of France”
A thousand procedural pages
At the end of the preliminary investigation carried out by the criminal brigade of the PJ of Paris (a thousand procedural pages, many technical reports, hundreds of hearings and 96 seals), the former Paris prosecutor, Rémy Heitz, had dismissed the hypothesis of a criminal origin and indicated to favor the accidental thesis.
The police also highlighted the track of a short circuit, perhaps attributable to the installation in 2007 of electrified bells by cables connected to the 220 volt which spun in the attic of the building. They had notably served during the 850th anniversary of the cathedral in 2013.
Until 2022, masses of rubble, contaminated with lead, were collected, then analyzed. In 2023, the investigating judge also authorized the lifting of the so -called “scarlet area » perimeter identified as that of the possible departure of the fire, located on a beam in the crossroads of the transept (difficult to reach, and in which the workers did not go).
The investigating judges and experts went to the scene again on March 6, 2024. In the process, the Paris prosecutor, Laure Beccuau, said that the instructing magistrates had also asked for a “Synthesis” with regard to “The extremely technical aspect” analyzes. To date, no one has been indicted.
