A man suspected of having killed Lilian Dejean, a municipal agent, in Grenoble in September, was arrested Thursday, November 21 in Portugal, and checks are underway to ensure his identity, announced the city prosecutor. alpine.
“A man likely to be Abdoul D.”suspected of the murder of Mr. Dejean, “has just been arrested in Portugal under the European arrest warrant » issued after the tragedy, Grenoble public prosecutor Eric Vaillant told the press. It is “thanks to the investigations carried out by French police officers” the organized and specialized crime divisions of Lyon and Grenoble, and “thanks to European police and judicial cooperation”that the suspect was able to be arrested, according to Mr. Vaillant.
Lilian Dejean, a 49-year-old father, was shot in the chest early on September 8, while trying to stop a man who had caused an accident while driving a powerful rental car registered in Poland to flee. The municipal employee died shortly after in hospital. The event aroused immense emotion among his colleagues and residents. The driver of the vehicle hit by the suspect during the accident, an elderly woman, was slightly injured.
Read also | Article reserved for our subscribers Drug trafficking: in Grenoble, the return of the “gang war”
Read later
Six gunshot deaths in Grenoble since the start of the year
As for the alleged murderer, aged 25 and whose identity document was found in the damaged car which he had abandoned on site, he has been wanted since. The police carried out several searches, notably where he was domiciled, in Saint-Martin-d’Hères (Isère), in the suburbs of Grenoble. A judicial investigation was opened for “murder of a person responsible for a public service mission”, “unintentional injury” “aggravated by speed and hit-and-run”, and “possession of category B weapons”, according to Mr. Vaillant.
The suspect is known to the courts in particular for “theft, violence and drug trafficking”, and for having beaten, with five fellow prisoners, another prisoner at the Varces remand center (Isère) in June 2023. Judged in August 2023 for this violence, he received a four-month prison sentence accompanied by a ban on possessing a weapon for five years. A week after his return to prison, he was involved in further violence for which he was to be tried on October 3.
Read also | “We are all Lilian”: in Grenoble, a white march in tribute to Lilian Dejean, municipal employee killed by gunfire
Read later
Since the start of the year, the metropolis of Grenoble has experienced renewed tension, with the judicial authorities no longer hesitating to speak of “gang war”. At the end of October, the prosecutor counted around fifty gunshots linked to drug trafficking since the start of 2024, which left six people dead.
