This is a probable “settling of scores between rival gangs against a backdrop of drug trafficking”. A man in his thirties was shot and killed in a building lobby on Thursday, December 19 in the evening in Valence (Drôme), consistent sources told AFP.
The victim was in an elevator on the ground floor of a building when several shots rang out shortly before 9:30 p.m., two police sources told AFP. The man, hit by several bullet holes, succumbed to his injuries without emergency services being able to resuscitate him, firefighters said.
“He was well known”
The man was known to the police, said the town hall of this town in Drôme, which evokes a probable “settling of scores between rival gangs against a backdrop of drug trafficking”. “He was well known, we are dealing with local drug trafficking,” confirmed Denis Iglesias, head of the Alliance de la Drôme union. According to him, the weapons used are Kalashnikov-type war weapons.
The perpetrator or perpetrators of the shooting are on the run. A vehicle, which could have been used in their escape, was found burned in another district of the city, police said.
Valencia, like many medium-sized cities, regularly experiences violence linked to drug trafficking. In May 2023, four men were shot and killed during score-settling between traffickers in this town of 65,000 inhabitants. In September, a man was beaten to death after a cocaine deal.
