The Nîmes public prosecutor’s office announced, this Tuesday, April 30, a large-scale raid leading to the placement in police custody of 13 people suspected of being involved in a double murder that occurred in October 2023.
Thirteen people were placed in police custody this Tuesday, April 30 as part of the investigation into a double murder committed at the end of October in Pont-Saint-Esprit (Gard) following an operation which mobilized 240 gendarmes, indicated the Nîmes public prosecutor’s office.
Two people were shot dead and two others seriously injured on the night of October 28 to 29 in front of the terrace of a café in this town located in the Rhône valley, Nîmes prosecutor Cécile Gensac said at the time. .
“The two deceased people were aged 24 and 25. One of them was known to the courts for offenses against drug legislation and pimping. The second was unknown to the justice services. The shots came from a group of hooded individuals, who fired directly at the people present” before leaving “on board a vehicle”, she added.
Six months after the events, investigators from the Nîmes research section “carried out several arrests” on Tuesday morning, Cécile Gensac said in a press release.
“Thirteen people were taken into police custody and will have to explain the offenses of murder by an organized gang, attempted murder by an organized gang, carrying, transport, possession of category A and B weapons, damage by an organized gang. “goods by dangerous means for people as well as participation in a criminal association with a view to committing a crime”, she detailed.
240 gendarmes and the GIGN mobilized
The magistrate does not specify where the arrests took place but indicates that “240 soldiers from the gendarmerie were mobilized (…), in particular the gendarmes from the gendarmerie group of Gard, Vaucluse, Bouches-du-Rhône, Rhône, the GIGN intervention force, two GIGN branches, two specialized gendarmerie protection platoons, as well as four dog teams.
In her press release, the prosecutor also explains that these police custody “can last four days in the case of offenses linked to organized crime” and that “the investigating magistrate and the deputy prosecutor referring ‘organized crime’ were present on places”.
