The suspect had already been arrested twice for drunk driving, according to the prosecutor’s office.

The man charged after the death of a police officer in Mougins (Alpes-Maritimes) on Monday evening already had ten convictions on his criminal record and had been arrested twice for driving under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs, the Grasse public prosecutor’s office said on Thursday 28 August.

“All the sentences he was sentenced to have been carried out”insisted the prosecution in its press release published on Thursday, specifying that of these ten convictions “six concern road traffic offences, the other four being attacks on people”.

The 39-year-old man was sentenced on May 9, 2018 by the Grasse court to two months in prison. “executed in the form of home detention under electronic surveillance” for driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs.

He had also been arrested on September 23, 2023 for drunk driving, an offense for which he would be officially notified of his conviction to a four-month license suspension and a 600 euro fine on September 12, in two weeks.

“France killed my husband through its inadequacy”

On Wednesday, during a ceremony in Mandelieu-la-Napoule, where the motorized platoon to which her husband belonged was based, Harmonie Comyn, the gendarme’s widow, accused France of having killed her husband: “France killed my husband through its inadequacy, its laxity and its excess of tolerance”she had said.

“Why is this repeat offender allowed to move around freely? When will our lawmakers truly open their eyes? Do they have to be directly affected to act? How many deaths will there be before these murderers are truly punished?”she continued.

The tragedy occurred around 8:40 p.m. on Monday, when a person in a black BMW refused to be stopped, according to the gendarmerie. The vehicle violently hit Eric Comyn while he and his colleagues were carrying out a routine traffic check at an exit ramp of the A8 motorway.

Warrant officer member of the motorized gendarmerie platoon, he was 54 years old and father of two children. Arrested in Cannes around 4 o’clock in the night from Monday to Tuesday, about eight hours after the events, the suspect had a positive alcohol level. He was then brought before an investigating judge, charged, in particular, with “murder of a person in authority”and placed in provisional detention, informed the Grasse public prosecutor’s office on Wednesday evening.