Valérie Pécresse announced this Thursday, September 26 that the Region would cover the legal costs of the family of Philippine, a 19-year-old student found dead on September 21 in the Bois de Boulogne. But the terms of this operation have not yet been specified.
“This family is not only devastated by grief and pain, but they also face legal fees to ensure justice is served. It’s a dramatic and totally unfair situation.” Valérie Pécresse announced this Thursday, September 26 at a regional council meeting that the Île-de-France region would cover the legal costs of the family of Philippine, a 19-year-old student found dead on September 21 in the Bois de Boulogne. . Heated controversies have erupted since a suspect, a 22-year-old man of Moroccan nationality already convicted in France for rape in 2019 and subject to an obligation to leave French territory (OQTF), was arrested Tuesday evening in Switzerland.
According to the local authority, Valérie Pécresse considered, during the hearing of the police prefect, Laurent Nunez, on security issues that Philippine’s family was in “an unfair situation”. Asked by Release regarding the legal framework of such an operation, the Region specifies that it “supports [déjà] associations which help victims, which are able to provide assistance for them for their legal procedures to assert their rights”. This is for example the case of associations helping women victims of violence, homophobia or racism, we add. “The associations respond to calls for projects and are financially supported by the region.” To the question of whether the Region could give money via an association, the local authority replied that this “could be a hypothesis”. But the precise terms of this financing have not yet been determined at this stage.
Republicans want to extend the retention period
This is not the first time that Valérie Pécresse has spoken out about this drama. She had already estimated on Wednesday on “the profile of Philippine’s alleged murderer sends shivers down your spine”. “How can a rapist released from prison and under OQTF walk our streets with complete impunity? How can we justify this new failure of the State to our family and friends? Enough is enough. Force must return to law and order.”
This Thursday, the deputies of the Republican Right group, led by Laurent Wauquiez, announced a little earlier the tabling of a bill in the Assembly “aiming to better protect society from dangerous illegal aliens and to facilitate their expulsion”. They therefore propose to carry “the maximum period of detention of irregular immigrants at 135 days instead of the 90 currently planned”or even 210 days “for a foreigner convicted of a crime” – deadline already applied to perpetrators of terrorist acts.
The right-wing deputies also want to restrict the role of the judge who must validate each extension of detention, by removing “justification obligations up to 90 days”. After this deadline, they also want to remove from the judge the possibility of releasing a foreigner before the maximum deadline, as long as his country of origin has not given assurance of providing “within a short time” a consular pass allowing his expulsion.
The man suspected of having raped and killed Philippine was released from the Metz administrative detention center on September 3, a few days before Morocco responded positively to the request from the French authorities. The student’s funeral takes place this Friday at Saint-Louis Cathedral in Versailles at 1 p.m. A support fund had already been launched by relatives of the victim.
