“It’s one of the [attentats] the most violent ever recorded in recent years”, comments Roger Gicquel on the 8 p.m. news of TF1, November 2, 1976. The previous night, the building of the Villa Poirier, in the 15th arrondissement of Paris, where Jean-Marie Le Pen, his wife and their three daughters reside, was blown up by a bomb. A look back at this significant episode in the Le Pen family as the founder of the National Front died on Tuesday January 7.
In the middle of the rubble, a few hours after the explosion, the leader of the National Front testified: “It is obvious that this explosion, this attack, aimed to kill indiscriminately, savagely, and that it is a gift from heaven if this result was not achieved.” Jean-Marie Le Pen, his wife Pierette and their three daughters, including Marine Le Pen then aged eight, were at home at the time of the events.
The results of the explosion show six minor injuries, including four children, among neighbors of the Le Pen family. Twelve buildings in the neighborhood and several cars parked in the street were also damaged. According to the police, it was on the 4th floor of the building, on the landing of the Le Pen home, that the explosives (at least 5 kg) were positioned.
This is the third attack of which Jean-Marie Le Pen is the victim“an unenviable record”, he believes. “I can only link this to our national congress whose theme was the security of the French and the fight against crime,” he said, while the fourth party congress has just ended in Bagnolet in Seine-Saint-Denis. “I think it’s a backlash from the criminals”he concludes. Although the attack was claimed by an anti-fascist committee, investigators were unable to formally identify the perpetrators.
A private detective hired by the Le Pen family, Antoine Méléro, puts forward another lead. He believes that it would be a matter of revenge because of the legacy of Hubert Lambert perceived by Jean-Marie Le Pen, a few weeks earlier. Died at 42 from cirrhosis, the millionaire, member of the party’s central committee, decided to bequeath him two thirds of his fortune estimated at 100 million francs as well as the Montretout manor in Saint-Cloud. A will contested in particular by one of the cousins of the deceased.
Marine Le Pen says she was deeply upset by this attack. In his autobiography, Against the wavespublished in 2006, she writes: “It took this night of horror for me to discover that my father was in politics. And it was there, at the age of dolls, that I became aware of this terrible and incomprehensible thing for me: my father he is not treated equal to others, we are not treated equal to others. This will become a major element of my own construction“.
