- Filmed from a building, a video shows police officers controlling a pedestrian on the street, in Asnières-sur-Seine (Hauts-de-Seine), according to his legend.
- Control proceeds smoothly until the police kick the pedestrian and spray the tear gas.
- Contacted, the Prefecture of Police confirms this control carried out during confinement but evokes a necessary gesture to escape the pedestrian postions. What the videographer behind the sequence contests.
Over a million views and nearly 28,000 retweets: on Twitter, a video has been driving the counters since it went online on March 18, the day after the first day of confinement.
According to the legend which accompanies it, the sequence - which was also taken up and put on line by other Net surfers - shows a control of certificate of exit in Asnières-sur-Seine (Hauts-de-Seine).
On 4 controls that I saw at the bottom of my house 3 ended like that, a pure hagra simply. pic.twitter.com/8NnhH972DI
- Mirio 1m92 ﷺ (@AbdessG) March 18, 2020We see policemen, in a street, advancing towards a pedestrian who hands them a black object. But while he is putting it away, one of the policemen kicks him before spraying him with tear gas in the face - at 0'16, a very fast sequence that we can see better at idle - while the person filming from his building calls the police officer while covering him with insults.
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The video was indeed filmed in Asnières-sur-Seine, more precisely in rue Robert Lavergne, as we can check on Google Maps.
Contacted by 20 Minutes , the Paris Prefecture of Police confirms that "the video seems to correspond to an intervention in the afternoon of March 18 in Asnières-sur-Seine".
“The local staff carried out a verification of movement certificate on an individual walking on the street and coughing. He then advanced to the police who repeatedly asked him to back up and keep a safe distance, "she continues. "The person not being able to present the requested documents, the police indicated to him that he could be the subject of a verbalization of 135 euros, which had the effect of irritating him. The offender then began to postillonne in the direction of the official who used his leg and tear gas to avoid any risk of contamination ”.
If the controlled person is very close to the policeman in the video, it is impossible to check, at this distance, whether he is spitting on him before receiving the kick.
This version is in any case contested by the person who filmed the video, according to his testimony, collected by the "collective of citizen volunteers Journalists in solidarity": "I saw that the young man did not fight or didn't defend himself, he just wanted to present his papers and he got kicked. "
💬He agreed to testify to what he saw from his balcony, on March 18, around 5 p.m. Here is his testimony, collected by us: pic.twitter.com/Y1NY5SRUBS
- Solidarity Journalists • Informed ▶ ️ Better protected (@JournalistesSol) March 23, 2020Society
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