six people in police custody for the fire which affected the Pissevin police station

Six people, including three minors, suspected of having participated in the fire in a business which affected the police station in the sensitive Pissevin district of Nîmes in August, were placed in police custody on Tuesday, the prosecution indicated in a press release. On the night of August 20 to 21, a fire ravaged a premises adjoining this brand new police station, not yet inaugurated, in the Pissevin district, one of the poorest in France, an area plagued by drug trafficking. .

Suspects known for drug trafficking

This new police station was promised by the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, the day after the tragic death of a 10-year-old boy, Fayed, the victim of a stray bullet a few steps away a year earlier . Concerning the fire, the investigation quickly determined that the disaster had been caused “by a massive spread of fuel via the chimney of a butcher's shop then under construction”, next to the police station, whose building had been “affected in its solidity by the consequences of the fire”, according to the Nîmes public prosecutor's office.

The six suspects, all from Nîmes, are between 15 and 28 years old. They are known for drug trafficking, but “as the investigation stands, nothing establishes with certainty a link between the destruction by fire and drug trafficking”, said the prosecution.