Community tensions erupted in Montpellier after the death of a 14-year-old teenager, crushed by a car following the France-Morocco football match on Wednesday December 14.
That evening, in the Mosson district, a group of about twenty young people surrounded a white Citroën C4 and tried to snatch a French flag from the vehicle.
The driver then drove off hastily before turning around and fatally running over a 14-year-old minor of North African origin.
The driver then fled.
“
The car was not stolen so the driver was quickly identified
,” a police source tells us.
This individual, on the run and wanted by the police, would come from the Traveler community.
The ethnic origin of the victim and that - supposed - of the suspect triggered strong tensions.
During the night from Thursday to Friday, four sections of CRS were deployed in the Mosson district, north-west of Montpellier, "
in order to prevent any confrontation between the community of Travelers and the Maghreb community
", indicates a well-informed source in
Le Figaro
.
Read alsoFrance-Morocco: overflows identified throughout the country after the match
According to our information, the apartment of the passenger of the vehicle involved in the fatal accident was broken into and ransacked during the night.
This man, beaten up after the fact, has been hospitalized since.
A video, broadcast Thursday, December 15 on social networks, shows a group of about twenty individuals running, probably in the Mosson district, shouting "
Allah Akbar
" or "
the gypsies, whores, we will n***** your mothers
”.
The driver actively sought
A first punitive expedition would have taken place on Thursday morning.
A man from the gypsy community was found with his throat slit, but alive, a police source tells us.
This individual would then have been transported to the Montpellier University Hospital escorted by the BRI (research and intervention brigade, editor's note), continues this source.
The police are still actively looking for the driver.
"
The investigation is progressing rapidly under the direction of the prosecution
," said Thursday the prefect of Hérault in a press release.
Contacted, the Montpellier prosecutor's office does not wish to make any additional comments "
in this active phase of investigation
".
“
The disappearance of Aymen plunges us into a terrible ordeal
”, for its part reacted the family of the teenager killed in a press release relayed by the town hall of Montpellier.
"
We call for the greatest calm and express our confidence in the institutions of the Republic, police, justice
" she added, asking the media to respect her "
mourning
" and her "
privacy
".
