the essential
A man in his thirties was arrested at Toulon station (Var). He is suspected of having killed a homeless person using a concrete block and of having attacked several people using the same method.
Did the investigators manage to get their hands on the man we now call the “cinder block killer”? A man, arrested this Tuesday, November 12 on a train coming from Marseille (Bouches-du-Rhône) is suspected of having brutally killed a homeless individual using a concrete block and of having violently attacked at least five other people. The person concerned is said to have operated in several French and Dutch cities.
What happened?
In the city of Lyon (Rhône), a homeless man of Moldovan nationality was discovered dead on Monday November 11 with a large wound on his head, a bloody concrete block next to him. A video surveillance camera had filmed a person hitting him in the head and very quickly, an investigation for “assassination” was opened.
The parallel is quickly established with an attack that occurred on October 23 in Evry-Courcouronnes where a man, who was sleeping, received a concrete block on the face. Initially hospitalized with a vital prognosis, the victim was finally given a total incapacity for work for 45 days, explained the prosecution.
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What concerns investigators is the profile of the victims and the method of operation. More recently, another homeless person was attacked on the night of November 4 to 5, in Rotterdam (Netherlands) using a concrete block. Again, the scene had been filmed. A police source also mentions an attack in Strasbourg on October 30 and another in Dijon last July: a woman was then attacked.
What do we know about the arrest of the suspect?
On the evening of Tuesday, November 12, the railway police were called after the attack on a young woman on board a train. Its author was arrested at Toulon station.
“After checking the file of wanted persons, they realized that he was the subject of an arrest warrant issued by an investigating judge in Evry,” said Toulon prosecutor Samuel Finielz. This arrest warrant was issued after the attack that occurred on October 23 in Evry-Courcouronnes.
What do we know about the suspect?
To the police, the individual presented himself as a 32-year-old Cameroonian subject to an obligation to leave French territory (OQTF), according to a police source. In a wanted notice, published on the internet, the Dutch police released an image of a dark-skinned man, aged around thirty, wearing a black jacket, blue pants and orange lace-up shoes.
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“The man has been placed in detention and measures will be taken to ensure that he is transferred to the ordering investigating judge,” he added, without giving further details. Analyzes, in particular DNA, are underway to verify whether the man arrested is indeed the author of this homicide, according to a judicial source.
