Hostage-taking at Arles prison by an inmate: a doctor released

An inmate who took five people hostage this Friday, January 3 at the end of the morning in the central house of Arles, in Bouches-du-Rhône, surrendered to the authorities in the middle of the afternoon. “The hostage taker surrendered. No injuries »indicated the Bouches-du-Rhône police headquarters, specifying that the police prefect, the public prosecutor and the mayor of Arles were going to make a press briefing on site.

The prisoner had already released a doctor early in the afternoon but was still holding four people shortly before 4 p.m.

The hostage-taking began around 11:15 a.m. in the health unit of the Arles central house, said a prison source, confirming information from the local daily “La Provence”. “The situation remains calm”a source close to the matter then said.

An inmate equipped with a homemade pick and known for “significant psychiatric disorders” retained four nursing staff and a prison guard. The man does not present “not a terrorist profile”according to a prison source.

A “very impulsive” and “violent” individual

Aged 37, the man was incarcerated for rape at gunpoint. He says he wants “change prison center”according to the source close to the file. The inmate was eligible for release in 2031, said a source close to the case. To “Parisien”, a judicial source described the man as “very impulsive” et « violent » and would have already had “ problems of violence in detention.

Several intervention forces, including the Raid, were deployed on site. “We have mobilized all means to deal with it”assured on X (ex-Twitter) the new Minister of Justice Gérald Darmanin, saying he followed “in real time the evolution of the situation”.

Prisoners at risk

The Arles central prison, a prison created in 1991, is reserved for prisoners sentenced to sentences of more than 10 years of criminal imprisonment or presenting security risks. It was in this establishment that Corsican independence activist Yvan Colonna was detained, and it was there that he was fatally attacked by a fellow inmate in 2022.

Yvan Colonna was serving a life sentence there for the assassination of prefect Claude Erignac in 1998 in Ajaccio. He had been violently attacked in the sports hall by Franck Elong Abé, a radicalized 36-year-old man convicted in particular in a terrorist case.

This prison, closed for six years, between 2003 and 2009, after being flooded during a flood of the Rhône, had also hosted an inmate like Jean-Marc Rouillan, member of the far-left armed group Direct Action, of which he had was one of the co-founders.