Seriously injured by a bullet shot by a municipal police officer after having poured gasoline in an office of the building on August 21, the 46-year-old man of French nationality could not be questioned after the events “due to his medical situation and the psychological problems noted by the doctors”, recalls the public prosecutor of Angoulême, Stéphanie Aouine, in a press release.
Once his hearing was deemed possible, he was “placed in hospital custody” on Monday. During his hearing, he “remained evasive about his motives, indicating nevertheless that he was targeting property, in this case the town hall premises, and not the people who were there, and that he had not acted for a religious motive”, added the magistrate.
At the end of this police custody, the man was charged “with attempted homicide of persons charged with a public service mission, attempted homicide of persons in authority and destruction by dangerous means”, indicated the prosecutor, who added that she had requested that he be placed in provisional detention.
The man, who has no criminal record, burst into Angoulême town hall around midday after parking his vehicle, which bore inscriptions in Arabic – the Muslim profession of faith.
Having spread gasoline in an office where two assistants were, then threatened a police officer with a flaming chain, he was hit twice in the chest by shots from a municipal police officer and hospitalized in “absolute emergency”. The fire was quickly extinguished.
On August 23, the prosecution had put forward “the hypothesis of reproaches made by the person concerned towards the Angoulême town hall”, adding that the man was socially integrated but “had suffered for several years from behavioral disorders which had notably led to psychiatric care in 2023”, with in particular “a tendency towards suspicion and a feeling of persecution”.
The Angoulême public prosecutor’s office has opened a second investigation targeting the police officer who used his weapon. “The hypothesis of the officer’s self-defense situation” is “privileged”, the magistrate said in her press release on Tuesday.
