Man Loses Foot Function After Police Shooting in Isère, France

The facts date back to June 15. Around 9 p.m., Toufik B. was riding a scooter on the riverbank road along the Drac river, "perched on a dike" and closed to motorized vehicles. "Suddenly, people emerged from a bush and sprayed me with gas. I didn’t understand what was happening, I didn’t see that they were police officers. I thought it was an assault. I was scared and I kept driving. Then I hear a gunshot. [...] The bullet entered through the back of the knee and came out on the side of the thigh," recounts the victim. Toufik loses a lot of blood. While he has stopped at the place where the dike crosses the Vercors bridge, he is surprised by other police officers. One of them blocks him at the chest level with his foot while aiming a weapon at his face, reports Le Parisien.

"This violence is totally incomprehensible," protests his lawyer, Emmanuel Decombard. "At that moment, my client is injured, on the ground... He is not known to the police, so the police cannot claim that they are dealing with someone with a reputation for being violent, dangerous or armed. Of course, he made a mistake in riding a scooter on this dike, but it’s a matter of a fine, it’s not an offense. He wasn’t Fangio, he was driving at a moderate speed, with a helmet, on a registered vehicle that wasn’t stolen. Nothing justifies the use of a 9mm weapon, especially since he was shot in the back! He had already passed the police when the officer pulled the trigger."

These police brutalities have serious consequences. He lost the use of his right foot. "The surgeon told me I was lucky," Toufik sighs. The 54 stitches that closed his wound left him with a huge scar. Emmanuel Decombard assures that his client was a victim of violence with a weapon by a person holding public authority, resulting in permanent disability. "It depends on the assize court, it’s criminal. We have to question this growing use of firearms."

For a month and a half, the Grenoble lawyer has had no news from the IGPN investigators in Lyon. He then filed a complaint on July 28. Two procedures are underway. One concerns the unintentional injury caused by the municipal police officer. The latter claimed to be in self-defense and a victim of intentional violence. He is therefore the origin of the second procedure.