On April 8, during confinement, a man was killed at the Béziers police station, where he was taken after a difficult arrest.
Despite attempts at resuscitation, the 33-year-old victim could not be saved.
Three municipal police officers present that day were taken into custody.
Three agents of the municipal police of Béziers were taken into custody on Thursday morning for willful violence resulting in death without intention of giving it, by a person holding public authority in the exercise of his functions and not- assistance to person in danger.
An investigation that comes after the death of a man in April, during a control.
Held on the stomach
The facts date back to April 8, in full confinement.
A 33-year-old man, Mohamed Gabsi, was then killed during a police check, after more than three quarters of an hour of attempted resuscitation in the premises of the Béziers police station, where he had been taken to the outcome of a difficult questioning.
At the time, the three police officers present had been heard in open hearing and had indicated that "the deceased man had refused the control and that he would have adopted a very aggressive behavior towards them", justifying according to them to proceed to his. interpellation.
The man had resisted strongly, and for a long time, the questioning.
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The municipal police officers had indeed had difficulty in handcuffing him and then getting him into the back of their vehicle.
By keeping him on his stomach during this arrest, a municipal police officer would also have sat on the buttocks of the individual in order to keep him until he was taken to the police station, a few hundred meters away.
He would then have calmed down during the transport, the three police officers even claiming to have heard him "snore", letting them think that he had fallen asleep, as the Béziers prosecutor's office had indicated at the time.
Questions about his death
The autopsy could not determine "with certainty the cause of death; which could result from cardiac arrhythmias of multifactorial origin (toxic and neurological) and from an asphyxia syndrome".
Toxicological analyzes revealed the presence of cannabis in the victim's body, taken shortly before death, and an exceptionally high presence of cocaine.
The forensic pathologists then indicated that "the toxicological analysis is in favor of the occurrence of death in a context of acute intoxication following a massive intake of cocaine, potentially lethal in itself".
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But according to the autopsy ordered by the Béziers prosecutor's office, the man suffered "a support maintained with a certain force in the cervical region, probably with a knee or an elbow, which seems to have certainly participated in the death by causing an asphyxia syndrome" .
Mohamed Gabsi was unemployed and the father of three young children in the care of their mother from whom he was separated.
He was known to the police and the judiciary and had been convicted 8 times since 2005, notably for violence and theft.
His last conviction was on April 7, 2020, the day before his death, for stealing money from the hands of a person leaving a distributor.
Facts for which he had been sentenced to six months in prison, without a committal warrant.