Significant resources have been deployed to find the man suspected of the murder of a municipal agent in Grenoble in September, the prosecutor's office and the police said on Friday the day after his arrest in Portugal after 74 days on the run.
“More than forty investigators” worked on the “hunting down” of the suspect and the case, “obviously a priority”, mobilized “a maximum of human and technical resources”, underlined Damien Delaby, zonal director of the judicial police during the a press conference.
This file was “major” in view of “its sensitivity, the emotion which was caused in Isère and the facts of this particular seriousness”, he insisted.
Early Sunday, September 8, Lilian Dejean, a 49-year-old cleaning agent and father, was shot in the chest while trying to hold back a man who caused a traffic accident while driving a car. 'a powerful rental car registered in Poland.
Identity papers in the name of Abdoul Diallo, residing in Saint-Martin-d'Hères in the suburbs of Grenoble, were found in the car abandoned by its driver who had fled on foot. Lilian Dejean died shortly after in hospital.
This man, already having a long record, was arrested around 5:00 p.m. in Póvoa de Lanhoso, 70 kilometers north of Porto, said prosecutor Eric Vaillant during the press conference, welcoming the “excellent collaboration” deployed with the Portuguese authorities.
He is currently detained in Portugal under the European arrest warrant issued by the investigating judge in Grenoble but could be quickly extradited: “if everything goes normally, in 5-6 weeks, he could be in France” , he noted.
Aged 25, “he was first incarcerated by the Grenoble children's judge at the age of 15. He has 19 convictions on his criminal record, many for acts of violence but also for drug trafficking In total he was sentenced to six years in prison over the last ten years,” according to Mr. Vaillant.
Asked about the techniques which made it possible to locate the suspect in Portugal where “he probably thought he was safe”, the police were less forthcoming, referring to the “secret of the investigation”.
Investigations are continuing into possible accomplices who helped him in his escape.
– Relief –
The death of Lilian Dejean had aroused immense emotion in Grenoble, whose inhabitants had paid vibrant tributes to her the day after the murder, then during a white march. He was then buried in Guadeloupe.
The drama had all the more resonance as it took place in the middle of a black series for the metropolis of Grenoble, where according to the authorities a “gang war” between drug traffickers is being played out. At the end of October, the prosecution counted around fifty gunshots linked to drug trafficking since the start of 2024, which left six people dead.
The announcement of the arrest of the alleged murderer brought “relief” to his loved ones. “We had been waiting for this for weeks so that we could move forward with our mourning and anticipate the trial,” one of his brothers, Jean-Marc Dejean, told the regional daily Dauphiné Libéré.
Today, his relatives “are relieved, because they have a prospect of obtaining explanations.” according to their lawyer Romain Ruiz. Since September 8, they have “experienced moments of doubt, of despondency”, he told AFP. “But they never imagined that we would not arrest him” and “never questioned the work of the justice system and the police.”
“We are very happy that he was arrested,” greets their friend Louisa Ben Fakir. “We had heard that he had left France from the start. We knew we were on a good track.”
The environmentalist mayor of Grenoble, Eric Piolle, also welcomed the news of the arrest on the social network can be returned to them,” he wrote.
