A sign at the demonstration on November 21, 2020, in Toulouse (illustration).

-

FRED SCHEIBER / SIPA

  • On Saturday, November 21, many demonstrators gathered in Toulouse to protest against the government's health policy and the “global security” bill.

  • Shortly after the dispersal of the procession, a woman was the subject of a control and an arrest criticized by the various witnesses present on the spot, several of them having filmed the scene.

  • Was this woman arrested by a police officer who tried to force her to testify to have seen a protester throw a projectile at the police?

    20 Minutes

    reconstructs the sequence of this sequence, with different witnesses and images of the arrest.

With the approach of a new national day of mobilization, on December 5, against the “global security” bill and its controversial article 24 - providing for criminal sanctions for any dissemination of images “undermining physical integrity or psychic "of the police - the images of a police intervention recently filmed in Toulouse arouse a stir on social networks.

And for good reason: according to the legend accompanying this sequence divided into several videos, it would show a "woman manhandled and taken away [by the police] because she refused to testify against a protester already arrested" and the police "[close ] the shutters of the neighbors to prevent them from filming!

»On November 21, in Toulouse.

Woman mistreated & embarked because she refused to testify against a protester already arrested they wanted to force the lady to testify and say that this protester has "attacked the police" they close the shutters of the neighbors to prevent them from filming!

11/21/20 Toulouse pic.twitter.com/ylCnG8mRG8

- The General 💎 (@LE_GENERAL_FRA) December 2, 2020

The first video shows a woman searching her bag, a stone's throw from her bicycle and an undercover police officer asking for her ID.

In response to the unintelligible words of the cyclist, the police officer then throws at her: “You witnessed the facts, madam, you just said it in front of me, so I will note your identity.

"

As she explains that she does not have an identity document with her, the police officer approaches her - announcing aloud to her colleagues "I have an identity check!"

- while another policeman prevents him from leaving.

The videographer, who had previously filmed the scene very closely, then finds herself removed by a third member of the police.

A setting aside which she takes advantage of to get a surgical mask from a neighbor who films the scene from the window of her apartment located on the ground floor.

If the police end up providing the mask to the cyclist, the videographer finds herself again forced to step back and film the rest of the events from afar.

While she asks the two policemen deliberately obstructing her view: "Why force her to testify?"

", We hear the woman being checked, in the background, repeating:" I want to go home "or" I haven't done anything! "

".

The video ends with his cries, which provoke the indignation of the various residents present in the street.

While the La BAC police violate the lady, their colleagues prevent passers-by and even neighbors from filming, they gassed 2 neighbors at their homes and forced the shutter so as not to film the blunder # ViolencePolicières One more woman 😣😣 21/11 / 20 Toulouse pic.twitter.com/hE7ODawraC

- The General 💎 (@LE_GENERAL_FRA) December 2, 2020

"While the BAC [anti-crime squad] violates the lady, their colleagues prevent passers-by and even neighbors from filming, they gassed two neighbors at their home and forced the shutter so as not to film the smear," says the legend of the second video - filmed by another witness - in which we see a police officer holding his hand on a white shutter.

Finally, in the third and last sequence, the videographer at the origin of the first images collects the testimony of one of the two neighbors again present at the window, who affirms to him, about the cyclist controlled by the police officers: “They demanded to search his bag when it was just a passerby.

They swept it away, they put it on the ground, I have the videos.

[…] They put down the shutters and gassed us.

"

FAKE OFF

This eventful arrest went well in Toulouse, Saturday, November 21 at the end of the afternoon, at the end of the massive demonstration against the health policy of the government and the bill "global security".

Specifically at the end of Damloup Square, as can be seen on Google Street View.

The place of the arrest that went viral in Toulouse, November 21, 2020. - Google Street View

Virginie, the protester who filmed the most viral video of the arrest, explains to

20 Minutes

 : “It happened a little after 4 pm, after the rather harsh dispersion of the demonstration.

A group of demonstrators of which I was part went up the rue Gabriel Péri, and we saw members of the Bac in this small street, who started running to stop a man who allegedly threw a bottle at the police.

But when they called him out, they jostled a woman who was on the side, whom I had not seen in the demonstration and who was not equipped as such.

She was obviously picking up or dropping off her bike and I started filming because I felt it was going into a spin.

"

20 Minutes

was able to view the images a few minutes before the request for an identity document relayed on social networks.

We see the plainclothes policemen around the man arrested and especially one of these agents picking up the cyclist's bike, on the ground, to put it back on its feet, while throwing at him: “You're going!

When no one listens to me ... I ask you to step back, if you do not step back, I push you, madam!

You take your bike and off you go now!

"

First tense exchange between the police officer and the cyclist, in Toulouse, November 21, 2020. - screenshot

"You piss us off, go there!"

"

As the cyclist returns to her bicycle, one of the officers seems to reproach the man who was initially arrested with a "projectile throw", who is at that time pinned to the ground and held on his stomach by a colleague. only a few meters from the bike.

The tension rises when the latter seems to strike the head of the man on the ground and Virginia starts to cry "No!"

Hey !

Not the slaps, not the slaps!

They are not necessary, this gentleman, he is on the ground, you control him.

[…] No blunder, we don't add more.

"

Which earned him this response from one of the agents: "He did not receive any [slaps], now you piss us off, go there!"

", Who adds, a few seconds later, while the cyclist is recovering his bike:" You filmed when he threw a stone at the police, madam?

You lack objectivity and I knew it.

"

Shortly after, while Virginie approaches the cyclist to ask her if "it's okay", one of the agents asks the latter to put on a mask.

After crossing the street and seeing herself reminded to put on a mask again, the woman on the bicycle tells him: “It's okay, I heard!

It's okay !

Don't talk to me like that, you don't have to give me orders!

"

The second exchange between the cyclist and the police in Toulouse, November 21, 2020. - screenshot

Three policemen then approach her, telling her that she risks a fine, before finally backing off, while Virginie asks the cyclist if she can "still ride", which leads the woman to deplore that the policeman has "Fucked his bike on the ground."

Calm reigns for a few seconds, while the police, in line in front of the arrested man (now seated on the ground), await the arrival of a police van.

However, they exchange a few words from a distance ("come closer, brave!") With a man who apostrophe them on the other side of the square.

An exchange that can be found from the point of view of the protester in question, Morgan, from 2'18'24 in his video broadcast live on Facebook.

Just after other demonstrators observing the scene from afar told him that the man arrested was, according to the police, for having thrown an empty water bottle on them.

"Madame has just said it, she is a witness"

"I was at the demonstration and after a few hours, while we were on a boulevard, we were dispersed by tear gas shots and we left in the small streets next door", Morgan specifies to 

20 minutes 

to explain his presence nearby.

At the same time, at the other end of the square, the cyclist confides in Virginie “You know what happened?

In fact, we walked, he threw a can… ”, who replied“ I saw, he had a bottle ”.

Right after the cyclist added aloud: “No kidding, what is it?

It was just a can, it's good!

", One of the police officers points the finger at his colleagues while launching:" Madame has just said it, she is a witness!

»Before coming towards her and saying:« Madam, I will take your identity, you will be able to testify since you know the nature of the projectile ».

The police officer, when he walks towards the cyclist to ask her for an identity document, just before the start of the video that has gone viral (in Toulouse, November 21, 2020).

- screenshot

This is when the sequence that has gone viral on social media begins, as a police truck arrives in the background at the scene.

"I thought they were blaming him for his lack of a mask so I quickly went to get one from the neighbor who was filming the scene from his house, but they didn't want to take it, I had to tell them" it is also for your protection!

»», Explains Virginie.

While she is worried, a little later, of the cyclist's screams, one of the agents tells her: "She just has to put her bag back on, if she does, there is no problem, madam."

"

At this moment, Morgan, who approached the police cordon with other people to take a closer look at the control of the cyclist, films (from 2'22'43 in his live video) one of the police officers , his hand resting on the closed shutter of the neighbor who was filming the scene from his home a few minutes earlier.

If nothing makes it possible to verify, on the images, that the neighbor - contacted without success by

20 Minutes

- was gassed, the police officer is clearly relying on this shutter which was not closed a few minutes before.

Legal proceedings against the woman arrested

On images filmed by other witnesses and that we were also able to consult, the cyclist, cornered against a wall, tries for her part to resist the attempt to search her bag by one of the agents.

Finally, in the last sequence we were able to watch, concordant with Morgan's live (from 2'24'19) as the police handcuff her and get ready to take her into their van, the crowd of onlookers gathered in front of the cordon of the police seeking to know the reason for his arrest.

One of the agents then replies: "You are right to be offended, she is rebelling, it is a crime!"

She resists the police, it's forbidden, it shouldn't exist!

"

Virginie specifies for her part: "In the end, they put the woman and her bicycle in the truck without us understanding the reason for the arrest since it was not for not wearing a mask: for me, it is clear that they wanted to force her to testify on the projectile which would have been launched.

"

Contacted in this regard, the prefecture of Occitanie affirms that "the person filmed, refusing the control, rebelled and struck the police officers" - blows which one does not see on the videos of the sequence - and "is the subject of legal proceedings".

Asked by

20 Minutes

 to find out what lawsuits it incurs, the Toulouse public prosecutor's office had not responded to our requests before the article was posted online.

Justice

Toulouse: On the strength of a video, a police commander convicted of gassing a disabled "yellow vest"

Media

Report information that you believe to be false to the "Fake Off" team of "20 Minutes"

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