On April 10, 2021, the lifeless body of Pierre Sourgen was found, lying in blood, his face smashed and kicked in a technical room of his residence in Floirac. The police investigation showed that a group of young people, who had come to squat on the premises to drink and smoke, ignoring the rules linked to the health crisis, had undoubtedly been disturbed by the sixty-year-old.
For an inappropriate, implausible remark or for nothing, Pierre Sourgen, prevented from going out by a young person who blocked his way, had been insulted, attacked, kicked even on the ground where he had fallen after a brush. The autopsy concluded that he died after “a major facial impact”, undoubtedly caused by a violent crush.
Of the five young people barely out of adolescence at the time of the events, one girl who remained passive in the face of the events appeared in court for failure to assist a person in danger. Romain Barros, designated by others as having had a central role, was tried for murder and his three co-defendants, who claim to be afraid of him, for complicity.
Thirty years required
Speaking of “murder of incredible savagery”, of “enjoyable and barbaric collective killing”, the attorney general Michel Pellegry had requested twelve to thirty years of imprisonment. The magistrate had especially wanted the four boys who all kicked without him knowing, in the avalanche received, which one was fatal, to be convicted of murder, considering them co-perpetrators of the facts. He was heard. To the great dismay of the other defense lawyers who, wanting to avoid “all in the same basket”, asked for a reclassification of the facts as… intentional violence.
Belgium
