Brav-M recorded: police officers threatened with disciplinary council or warning

Europe 1 with AFP / Photo credits: Maxime Gruss / Hans Lucas / Hans Lucas via AFP 21:49 p.m., May 02, 2023

Arrested threatened and humiliated: the General Inspectorate of the National Police (IGPN) has proposed to refer three Brav-M police officers to the disciplinary council and to sanction four others with a warning for having failed in their duties at the end of March in Paris, according to sources close to the case. The officials were accused by the police of one or more failures, including the duty of exemplarity, the duty of courtesy towards the public, the attack on the credit of the national police and the duty of protection of the person arrested, detailed these sources Tuesday.

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It's up to Laurent Nunez to decide

These conclusions of the administrative investigation of the IGPN are not a surprise, its boss Agnès Thibault-Lecuivre had announced that his services would "propose sanctions". At the end of March, a few days after the revelation by several media of a recording of threats and humiliating remarks by the police, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin had said that there would "obviously" be sanctions against police officers.

It is now up to the prefect of police Laurent Nuñez, who said Tuesday night on BFMTV not yet to have received these recommendations, to decide, either by validating them, or by revising them upwards or downwards.

The warning, the smallest sanction of the public service

The warning is a disciplinary sanction of the first group, the lowest in the public service, and is not mentioned in the officer's file. In the event of referral to a disciplinary board, police officers potentially face heavier penalties, from temporary exclusion for one day to dismissal, which is much rarer. "It's a start," Arié Alimi, a lawyer for two young people arrested, told AFP. "We are now awaiting the judicial follow-up of complaints for sexual assault, violence and insults of a racist nature, as well as for violation of individual freedoms," he added.

On the night of 20 to 21 March, members of the Brav-M (Brigade for the Repression of Violent Actions Motorized) had arrested seven young demonstrators, suspected of having taken part in damage in a wild procession in the center of Paris. One of the arrested had then discreetly recorded the exchanges with the police. "The next time we come, you will not get on the bus to go to the police station, you will get on another thing called ambulance to go to the hospital," threatens a police officer against a Chadian student, Souleyman Adoum Souleyman, particularly targeted by officials in the recording.

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Vacations "of 14 hours, even 16 hours"

Today, "Souleyman is determined to assert his rights and fully exercise his right to demonstrate," commented his lawyer, Mr. Alimi. In reports to their hierarchy of Brav-M agents on the evening of the facts, obtained by AFP, they had pleaded "physical and moral fatigue".

A brigadier had described "shifts of 14 hours, even 16 hours" during which, he said, "our basic and vital needs were not respected, hydration and restoration was very complicated". A judicial investigation, also entrusted to the IGPN, is still ongoing in this case.