The cold look and the impassive tone.
It is with a certain detachment that a group of teenagers observes, this Wednesday afternoon, the ten police officers busy at the foot of the Porquerolles tower, in Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine).
A few minutes earlier, however, it was a young man of 15, roughly their age, who collapsed to the ground, hit in the back by several bullets.
It was around 3 p.m. that the young man - known, despite his age, to the police and the courts - was targeted while he was riding a scooter in rue des Sorbiers, in the heart of the district. of Chemin-de-l'Ile.
“I didn't see anything, but I heard the detonations, blows a resident.
There were at least three or four shots ... "
A small caliber weapon
Shots of which the forensic identification technicians were still looking for traces, two hours after the facts, at the foot of the tower while the investigators of the PJ collected the first testimonies.
"This is a small caliber weapon," confides someone close to the file.
And at least three shots hit the victim ... "
Quickly taken care of by the emergency services, the teenager, whose days are not in danger, was transported to Bichat hospital, in the 18th arrondissement of Paris.
"He is not originally from the neighborhood but he knows people here and he often hung out in the area", slips a teenager who is reluctant, like most of his friends, to say more.
At Chemin-de-l'Ile, another awkward silence settles when the identity of the alleged shooter, still on the run, is mentioned.
"All I can say is that I saw someone running away just after the shots were fired," a young girl blurted out before her relatives encouraged her to shut up.
"It all looks like a settling of scores"
"It seems that the shooter and his victim knew each other well and were associated with each other for a while, for his part, a regular in the neighborhood.
It all looks like a settling of scores.
»A hypothesis which will be confirmed or denied by the men of the SDPJ to whom the investigation was entrusted.
"We still do not know the details of the case and the motives of the shooter but what we see is that the place is known for its drug trafficking, observes for his part the elected opposition (UDI ) Alexandre Guillemaud.
I receive more and more calls from residents who tell me they want to leave the neighborhood because they no longer feel safe there.
"
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In recent months, several arson fires have indeed punctuated the daily life of this district, the subject of an urban renewal plan.
In November, small dealers driven out by tenants set fire to the mailboxes of the Martinique tower.
More recently, on February 10, this same tower was evacuated after a fire in the technical room.
Bothered by the smoke, four tenants, including a pregnant woman, were then transported to the Foch hospital in Suresnes.