A municipal police officer from Saint-Étienne (Loire) used his service weapon twice to neutralize a man armed with a knife this Tuesday, November 26, around 5:30 p.m. The events took place at the corner of Charles-de-Gaulle and Grand-Gonnet streets, where the suspect had just attacked a passer-by. According to the public prosecutor, David Charmatz, who spoke in a press release this Wednesday afternoon, the man “grabbed the victim by the neck, pushed him to the ground and held a kitchen knife to his throat”.
Despite rapid emergency intervention, the attacker, a 31-year-old from Stéphane, died from his injuries. Identified in the evening, he was “well known to the judicial services for crimes of damage to property and violence”. He was released last May after
“served more than five years in prison in execution of several firm sentences”specifies the magistrate.
A violent journey before the attack
The prosecutor emphasizes that the individual had committed several offenses at the end of the afternoon. He was particularly guilty “of a violent theft in a business” and had wandered armed with knives near Place Jean Jaurès
“in a threatening attitude towards passers-by”. An investigation was entrusted to the Organized and Specialized Crime Division (DCOS), with the support of the Territorial Crime Division (DCT). It aims to reconstruct the attacker's journey, to collect testimonies and to allow victims “to be examined by a forensic doctor and to benefit from psychological help within the IML”.
A second investigation, for murder, led to the municipal police officer responsible for the shooting being placed in police custody. He, in a state of shock, was taken into care at the university hospital before being questioned. The policeman explained that he had used his weapon “to neutralize the assailant, fearing for the life of the victim who risked having his throat slit”. Municipal video surveillance recordings confirm this version and show that the police officer acted “in self-defense of others”. Custody has been lifted “during the night”the police officer's testimony being corroborated by the evidence collected.
The woman victim of the attacker gave her testimony to our colleagues of Progress :
A psychiatric crisis involved?
The first analyzes did not reveal “no terrorist connotation” in the attacker's path. His behavior seems to be linked to a “psychiatric decompensation”. The prosecutor said the man had called the police and emergency services the previous night, around 1:30 a.m., to report
“suicidal tendencies and a state of aggressive crisis”. However, he fled before help arrived and did not return home. The autopsy of the deceased will shed further light on the circumstances of the tragedy.
