Seized by the widow and children of the Corsican independence activist killed by a fellow inmate in Arles prison, the Marseille administrative court must determine whether the State was at fault in this murder.
Le Figaro Marseille
For the public rapporteur of the Marseille administrative court, there is not a shadow of a doubt: the State is responsible and at fault in the death of Yvan Colonna in Arles prison. In 2022, while exercising in the gym of this penitentiary center, where he had been detained for ten years after his conviction in the assassination of prefect Érignac, Yvan Colonna was fatally attacked by a radicalized fellow inmate , Franck Elong Abé.
At the time of the events, the latter had been classified as a “particularly marked detainee” (DPS) since November 2015 due to his “great danger” , of “its instability” and “the persistence of his violent behavior”, according to investigative documents. He was then serving several sentences, including a nine-year prison sentence for terrorist conspiracy, and was available for release in December 2023.
In a report published in May 2023 on the conditions of this fatal attack, a parliamentary commission of inquiry pointed out “serious failures” in the assessment of the dangerousness of Franck Elong Abé, a «rigueur» excessive prison treatment inflicted on Yvan Colonna and the “dysfunctions” of general order in the penitentiary establishment.
Many failures
This Monday, the widow of the Corsican separatist as well as his children seized the administrative court of Marseille to condemn the State for the moral and physical damage suffered by Yvan Colonna himself, in their capacity as heirs of this last. Before this trial, the State had offered the sum of 45,000 euros, refused by his widow and his children who for their part demanded the sum of 200,000 euros.
-Before the administrative court, the public rapporteur first returned to “the long minutes of pure violence and great barbarity” which led to the death of Yvan Colonna, victim according to her of a “real relentlessness” from Franck Elong Abé. The latter has “jumped in with both feet” on his victim, then crushing his neck and covering his face with a trash bag. A murder which occurred after “failures” and “wrongful failings of the State” according to her. “The management of surveillance by the administration of Yvan Colonna’s attacker seems problematic to me”estimates the magistrate. The public rapporteur is particularly surprised that the attacker of Yvan Colonna, although known to be radicalized, benefits from so many freedoms, and even from a job as an auxiliary despite his past, “a failure attributable to the prison administration.”
The rapporteur also deplored the malfunctions linked to video surveillance within the establishment, which meant that at the time of the attack, “no agent had the images of the scenario on the screen.” The fault of a lack of training of these agents but also, for one of them, to a “overconfidence” towards “inmates he knew and got along well with.”
A feeling of injustice among the Colonnas
To quantify the physical damage, the public rapporteur used a scale of 0 to 7 which assesses pain, and estimated that Yvan Colonna suffered maximum suffering during his murder. In her conclusions, the magistrate thus leans towards a condemnation of the State in the amount of 60,000 euros for the physical damage suffered by Yvan Colonna, to be paid to his heirs, in this case his widow and his two sons. As for the moral damage suffered by the separatist, the public rapporteur asks the court to order the State to pay these same people the sum of 15,000 euros. This sum is justified according to the magistrate in view of “imminent death anxiety” which Yvan Colonna certainly felt, as well as “the feeling of being left at the mercy of one’s attacker by the prison administration”.
“It’s a feeling of injustice that drives the Colonna family”recalls to the bar of the administrative court of Marseille their lawyer, Me Patrice Spinosi, who is waiting for judges “an exceptional decision” given this “exceptional deal”. “There is not much suspense over the administration’s declaration of responsibility, scolds the lawyer. It is acquired. There remain two essential questions. What is the basis of the administration’s responsibility? And how much? What is the value of the price of Yvan Colonna’s death?” The decision has been reserved and will be rendered in the middle of February.
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