“Unprecedented savagery” and “ultra rejuvenation”: the Marseille prosecutor clarified on Sunday that the victim of Wednesday’s narchomicide, “stabbed with 50 stab wounds and burned alive”, was a 15-year-old teenager, and that the alleged killer of Friday’s is 14 years old.
These two cases are linked, added Nicolas Bessone, during a press conference on Sunday morning, stressing that the victim of the second homicide, a 36-year-old father, VTC driver and amateur footballer known in the region, was “ totally external to drug trafficking” which is plaguing France’s second city.
“We have an ultra-rejuvenation” of the perpetrators and an external victim on Friday not hit by a stray bullet but “coldly shot down”, insisted the prosecutor, emphasizing “an additional degree” reached and “a total loss of bearings”.
Stabbed repeatedly before being burned
Friday’s narchomicide, which therefore did not hit the intended target, was the planned revenge of that of Wednesday, also underlined the magistrate, evoking “the context of the opposing conflict in the 3rd arrondissement of Marseille (the clan of) the DZ MAfia and the so-called ”Blacks” clan of the Félix-Pyat city for the takeover of the sales point of the Moulin de Mai city, at Belle de Mai.
The teenager killed on Wednesday was killed as part of the execution of a contract for which he had been recruited for 2,000 euros, via social networks, by a 23-year-old man detained at the Luynes penitentiary center, near ‘Aix-en-Provence, and presenting himself as belonging to the DZ Mafia. Supposed to go to intimidate a competitor, the teenager had been spotted by a gang present at the foot of the building, and it was after they noticed that he was carrying a handgun that they stabbed him. several times before burning it.
Recruited on social networks for 50,000 euros
It was following this death that the same inmate from Luynes ordered a second “contract” to take revenge by recruiting a 14-year-old minor, from Vaucluse, via social networks, to go and kill a member of the gang of “Blacks”, for 50,000 euros this time. Having left to carry out his mission aboard a VTC, the teenager allegedly asked the driver to wait for him. But he refused, angering the miner who shot him in the head with the 357 Magnum pistol he was armed with.
With these last two cases, the number of narchomicides, a term coined by Marseille justice to describe the settling of scores against a backdrop of drug trafficking, has now increased to 17 since the start of the year. According to figures from AFP and the public prosecutor’s office, this phenomenon is however down significantly in 2024 compared to the record number of 49 deaths in 2023.
