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Terrorism: the chilling explanations of the attacker of Colombes

2020-05-01T11:08:43.723Z


Referred this Friday morning before an examining magistrate for an indictment, the author of the attack on two police officers on Monday spoke


Three days and four nights after having run into two police officers driving his BMW in a street in Colombes (Hauts-de-Seine), Youssef T. was brought before this Friday morning before an anti-terrorism judge with a view to his indictment. The National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor's Office (PNAT) opened a judicial investigation for "terrorist assassination attempts on persons holding public authority" and requested that he be placed in pre-trial detention. The two police officers, bikers from the Directorate of Public Order and Traffic (DOPC), survived their injuries after undergoing, for one of them, a very heavy operation on the head.

During his police custody in the Parisian premises of the criminal brigade, Youssef T., a 29 year old Frenchman born in Lunéville near Nancy (Meurthe-et-Moselle) and domiciled in Colombes, displayed a cold determination. In the right line of the handwritten claim letter found in his car. "I pledge allegiance to Abu Walid al Sahraoui, the new emir of the Islamic State (Editor's note: a jihadist known to be very dangerous and hunted down in West Africa by French force Barkhane) and worthy heir to Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi ..." he had written, also mentioning his will "to throw himself headlong into the battle to impose sharia on the whole earth" and the wish "that [his] martyrdom be accepted by God".

"Hit the cop"

Orally, Youssef T.'s speech is chilling, clearly expressed and deemed "very consistent" by the investigators. Already accepting the idea of ​​being incarcerated for life since, he says, “Allah chose me”, he wanted, in his own expression, to “hit the cop” during a car ram attack. Before qualifying his remarks during the hearings and suggesting that he wanted above all to hurt them.

VIDEO. Colombes: a motorist rushes at the police, two injured

This attack plan would have formed in recent weeks. Monday April 27, at the end of the afternoon, he rolls in the streets of Colombes in search of an "opportunity". She shows up around 5:36 pm when he sees, boulevard de Valmy, 500 m from her home, two police officers checking the driver of a vehicle. It seems to be the first time that Youssef T. has found himself in this situation. However, he did not hesitate, pressed the accelerator and struck the two officials with full force. At the time of his arrest, he declared that he had voluntarily run into the police. In his vehicle, there are two knives, a large blade and a detent, as well as the letter of allegiance to the Islamic State group slipped into the sun visor.

The young man, single and childless, settled “two or three years ago” as a tenant in a low-cost building in Colombes, located in the city of Audra, near the Yves-du-Manoir stadium. Without mingling with the young people of the neighborhood, he established good neighborly relations with several residents of his building, at 22 avenue Audra. Its religious radicalization, invisible to the naked eye, has nevertheless formed day after day over the past three years, according to the first elements of the investigation. Still according to our information, the exploitation of his phone and his computer media reveals research on the Islamic State and terrorism.

The plan to go to Syria

Convicted in 2010 for acts of violence committed two years earlier in Saverne (Bas-Rhin), but unknown to the intelligence services and without any personal connection identified at this stage with radicalized individuals, he feeds his ideology on jihadist social networks. So much so that a year and a half ago, he told the investigators who interviewed him that he had plans to go to Syria. A project ultimately aborted due to unfavorable circumstances, especially for lack of financial resources it seems. After having worked as a handler in the port of Gennevilliers, Youssef T. was recently unemployed and received a monthly allowance of 1,200 euros, in addition to his housing allowance.

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In the background, the young man has long forged a strong pro-Palestinian conviction. In July 2014, for example, in the context of the Gaza war, he allegedly participated in one of the demonstrations organized in the streets of Paris. On this occasion, Islamic State flags appeared in the procession. In recent weeks, Youssef T. explains that he saw and reviewed, "during the confinement," he said, videos of children from Gaza. A way to justify the rise of his anger. And his passage to the act Monday afternoon, driving his black BMW. "I had heard voices for a few weeks, it was the spirit of Palestine," he explained during one of his hearings. The psychiatric examination held on Tuesday concluded that there had been no alteration or abolition of his discernment.

Source: leparis

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