A 16-year-old teenager was stabbed to death Tuesday morning near the Rodin high school in the 13th arrondissement of Paris during a brawl between rival gangs in which one of the participants was arrested, AFP learned from a police source.
“This murder is a continuation of a phenomenon of recurrent brawls between young people in the 13th arrondissement sector, where eight clashes have been noted since May 2024,” detailed the Paris prosecutor’s office.
A participant in the altercation was arrested, said a police source, specifying that the protagonists had also used tear gas and that the murder weapon, a knife, had been thrown into the courtyard of the middle school.
The events took place shortly before 8:00 a.m. about a hundred meters from the school during a brawl.
When the police arrived, “the protagonists had fled,” said a second police source. A minor “was in cardio-respiratory arrest (…) presenting head injuries”, added the prosecution, specifying that “despite attempts at resuscitation by the Samu”, the death of the teenager had been observed at 9:15 a.m.
According to the Ministry of National Education, the victim was 16 years old and attended a vocational high school in Alfortville (Val-de-Marne).
At the end of the morning, the street in front of the establishment was cordoned off by the police, noted an AFP journalist.
The murder investigation was entrusted to Paris territorial security.
– “The worst fight” –
Most of the students had already entered the establishment at the time of the events, said the mayor of the 13th century, Jérôme Coumet, present on site.
“For the moment, we do not understand the location of this tragedy” because “there were no warning signs in the establishments in the sector which could have put us on alert”, underlined the mayor in front of the press.
“This morning, he had to say goodbye to his parents. I put myself in his parents’ place, I’m so sad,” sighs Émile, 16, who attends the high school.
According to Maïssa, 16, who attends Rodin high school, “around 8:15-20 a.m., police officers started coming, people came to inspect (a) classroom.”
A mobile security team, the regional security brigade, and a psychological support unit “to support both the educational community and the students” were deployed, said the Ministry of Education.
Between 2022 and 2023, brawls between rival gangs increased by 10% in the Paris metropolitan area, reaching 413 incidents compared to 375, according to information communicated by the Paris police headquarters. There were four deaths in 2023 compared to three in 2022.
The number of injuries increased by 26% and that of the use of a weapon (of any kind) increased by 22.5% between 2022 and 2023.
“It’s a new tragedy in front of a school” which “confirms that there is an issue surrounding the treatment of fights between gangs and this cannot only be the responsibility of the School”, reacted to AFP Sophie Venetitay , general secretary of the SNES-FSU union.
“We need an interministerial policy (education, security, housing and youth, editor’s note) aimed at young people, to address the issue of rivalries between gangs at the root,” she added.
Several miners were seriously injured or killed during these clashes between rival gangs. In mid-October, Meissane, 16, was stabbed to death 900 meters from his high school in Aulnay-sous-Bois (Seine-Saint-Denis).
This phenomenon, detailed the public prosecutor’s office, is the subject of “closed attention from specific GLTDs (local delinquency treatment groups), bringing together the Paris public prosecutor’s office, the police headquarters, the regional prefecture, the city of Paris, National Education and Judicial Protection of Youth (PJJ)”.
The objective is that “the warning signs are detected as early as possible, communicated to other actors, and trigger preventive patrols as close as possible to the places of concern”, specified the prosecution.
