A 19-year-old man was sentenced to eight months in prison for rebellion, following violence committed Thursday, March 23 in Mulhouse (Haut-Rhin) on the sidelines of a demonstration against pension reform.
The sentence, pronounced Monday by the Mulhouse judicial court in immediate appearance, is accompanied by a five-month suspended sentence.
The young man, prosecuted for degradation by dangerous means, participation in a crowd and rebellion, was also prohibited from possessing a weapon for five years.
The police found three knives in his possession.
A 30-year-old man, who appeared alongside him, was given a six-month suspended prison sentence.
He was prosecuted for violence and for throwing a can at the police.
The aim was clearly to commit violence against the police.
Benjamin Coulon, public prosecutor
The two men had been arrested during the demonstration which brought together more than 5,500 people in Mulhouse according to territorial information.
Among them, about fifty demonstrators had confronted the police.
Considered one of the leaders, the youngest had violently jostled a police officer from the Anti-Crime Squad (BAC), who had injured his ankle.
The other had dragged a policeman by the legs who had fallen to the ground and hit him violently on the head, before his colleagues managed to get him to safety.
The public prosecutor, Benjamin Coulon, declared that “
neither of the two defendants was there to demonstrate peacefully.
The aim was clearly to commit violence against the police.
We are flabbergasted by their behavior
.”
Susan Bozok, lawyer for the two defendants, on the other hand considered that “
we want to blame the excesses of the group on these two men alone.
They were immature and no doubt carried by the group effect
”.