A 49-year-old municipal worker, employed in cleaning, was shot dead on Sunday in Grenoble, while he was trying to stop the drunken perpetrator of a road accident who was fleeing.
Several political figures have reacted to this tragedy, “an unspeakable act of extreme violence” according to the mayor and revealing, according to the LR MP for Doubs, “the blind and gratuitous violence suffered by all those who defend the general interest”.
At around 7:30 a.m. on Sunday, an Audi RS3, a powerful model with a Polish license plate, according to the prosecution, and traveling “at high speed”, hit a car stopped at a red light, a police source told AFP.
The driver of the Audi, who was drunk, according to the prosecution, then tried to flee. A passerby tried to keep him there and a city cleaning agent got out of his vehicle to lend him a hand, according to the same source.
The person responsible for the accident then fired twice at the municipal employee, said Grenoble prosecutor Eric Vaillant, confirming information from the local newspaper Dauphiné Libéré.
Two 9mm caliber shell casings were found at the scene, a police source added.
Images taken by Le Dauphiné Libéré show a strong impact at the rear of the vehicle hit and significant deformation at the front of the Audi.
The municipal employee, 49 years old and father of two children, died of his injuries during the day, the prosecutor announced early in the afternoon. He received two bullets in the chest, he specified.
– “Extreme violence” –
The driver of the hit vehicle, an elderly woman, was only slightly injured, according to a police source. She received six days of temporary work interruption, the prosecutor’s office said.
The prosecution has handed over the investigation to the police officers of the Grenoble Local Judicial Police Service (SLPJ), who are “actively searching for the shooter”, according to Mr. Vaillant.
His identity remained unknown as of late Sunday afternoon, according to the prosecutor.
“We are in mourning,” reacted the mayor of Grenoble, Éric Piolle, on the social network X, referring to “an unspeakable act, of extreme violence, which targeted one of his agents who was carrying out his municipal missions.”
He said the city will open a psychological support unit on Monday.
The national secretary of the Ecologists, Marine Tondelier, assured “her family, her loved ones and all the grieving people of Grenoble” of the full support of her political family.
The contested president of the Republicans party, Eric Ciotti, denounced “a new tragedy which reflects the explosion of violence and the lack of authority in our country.”
This incident “reveals the blind and gratuitous violence suffered by all those who defend the general interest”, said LR MP for Doubs Annie Genevard.
“It is obvious that measures must be taken,” said the opposition group to the Green mayor of Grenoble, which includes former right-wing mayor Alain Carignon, without specifying them. “The death in service of a respected municipal agent is an unbearable tragedy. We are devastated that it is a municipal agent devoted to his task, who reacted as a citizen, who is the victim of this savagery installed in the city,” the group added in a press release.
“All our thoughts go out to his loved ones, his work colleagues and comrades in the struggle,” reacted the CGT union of Greater Grenoble, to which the agent was affiliated, on X.
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