A national police vehicle (illustration).

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F. Brenon / 20Minutes

Raphaël Balland, the public prosecutor of Béziers (Hérault), said Thursday that a criminal investigation against X, on the count of violence that resulted in death without intention of giving it by persons holding public authority, had been opened , four years after the death of a man, in Béziers, who had just been arrested.

On September 22, 2016, around 4:30 a.m., the police attempted to apprehend a 46-year-old man known to the courts, whose sister had indicated that he had just left her home in the midst of a dementia crisis.

The man, "of strong build, very excited, simply dressed in underpants", ran in circles on the public road "while screaming incomprehensible words and banging on windows", reports the parquet floor.

Coronary heart disease and cocaine

Unable to calm him down, "including after having used tear gas, one of the police officers brought the individual to the ground where he was hardly kept for several minutes in the prone position", continues Raphaël Balland.

A few minutes later, the police noticed that the man had lost consciousness and placed him in a lateral safety position, while awaiting the arrival of the firefighters.

After several attempts at resuscitation, the man died at 5:30 am The entire scene was filmed by the city's CCTV cameras.

After several years of investigations, an expert had indicated that the death was in particular "consecutive to an acute coronary insufficiency on severe atheromatous coronary artery disease.

The decompensation of this previous pathological condition is mainly due to acute cocaine poisoning.

Another specialist specified that no gesture contrary to the police practices in force had been noted.

The procedure was discontinued on February 3.

But on March 13, a brother of the deceased had seized the dean of the examining magistrates of the court of Béziers so that a criminal investigation is opened, leading to the opening of a judicial investigation.

"It will now be for the investigating magistrate to assess whether other investigations are necessary for the manifestation of the truth to determine the causes of the death of the victim and possible criminal liability", specifies the prosecutor.

Miscellaneous

Béziers: After the death of a man at the police station, the autopsy evokes an "asphyxia syndrome"

Society

Police violence: "Political denial has become more and more complicated," says journalist David Dufresne

  • Languedoc-Roussillon

  • Interpellation

  • Investigation

  • Beziers

  • Justice