Four people were indicted Wednesday, August 16 after the deadly shipwreck occurred Saturday in the English Channel of a boat of migrants trying to reach England, during which six Afghans died, said a judicial source, confirming information from Le Monde.
These persons, suspected in particular of manslaughter and involuntary injury and endangerment by manifestly deliberate breach of a duty of care or safety, had been placed in police custody on the day of the tragedy.
These are two people of Iraqi nationality born in 1980, "suspected of being part of the illegal immigration network that organized the transport of migrants," said the Paris prosecutor's office. The other two incriminated persons are Sudanese nationals, born in 1994 and 2006 and "suspected of having actively participated in the transport of passengers in dangerous conditions in return for a preferential fare on their own passage", added the public prosecutor.
Custody
In addition to manslaughter and involuntary injury, the four were also charged with aiding illegal residence in an organized gang and criminal association to commit this offence. The prosecutor's office requested that they be remanded in custody.
The investigations, conducted under the direction of the Junalco (National Jurisdiction for the Fight against Organized Crime), have "at this stage established that the makeshift boat had suffered engine damage," said the Paris prosecutor's office.
The boat was thus "torn at sea, while the passengers did not have for the most part life jackets," added the public prosecutor. "A commercial boat alerted the rescue, which was immediately triggered," said the prosecutor's office. Several ships, "warned", then went to the area: "38 people were collected by the French rescue, 23 on the British side".
With AFP
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