Reuters documents 28 injuries linked to policing of French student protests

Reuters reported on October 10 that interviews and legal documents had established 28 cases of injuries caused by police force during school protests in France. Fifteen of those cases are among investigations handled by the IGPN police watchdog.

IGPN is investigating 24 cases connected to policing during more than two weeks of demonstrations over school conditions. Reuters described injuries involving rubber bullets, grenades, tear gas, batons and mounted police charges. Two cases involve the loss of, or injury to, an eye.

One injured teenager is Eden, 14, from Saint-Ouen-l’Aumone. His parents and lawyer Elsa Marcel said a tear gas grenade fired at close range broke his jaw and damaged his teeth. The family filed an attempted murder complaint. His surname has been withheld to protect his privacy.

According to the prosecutor, one officer first struck Eden with a baton and the teenager responded with a kick. Another officer used a Cougar grenade launcher. The officer who fired said he was protecting himself and colleagues. He was placed under formal investigation on Tuesday for assault by a public official resulting in permanent disability or disfigurement. That is not a conviction.

In Lens, a 15-year-old lost a hand. Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said a stun grenade was the likely cause and suspended the use of those grenades pending an investigation. In Argenteuil, a 16-year-old suffered an injury to his left eye. Lawyer Sophia Kerbaa could not establish which projectile struck him.

The prosecutor in the Argenteuil case relayed the police account that the teenager appeared to match one of two youths who had fired fireworks at officers, who responded with rubber bullets. The Interior Ministry did not answer Reuters’ questions about that case or Eden’s.

Nunez said on Wednesday that around 200 students had been injured but that police action was rarely the cause. Authorities also reported 700 injured officers and 6,877 arrests, mostly of minors, alongside school fires and attacks on people.

CNRS researcher Sebastian Roche said the scale of irreversible injuries to minors was unusual in contemporary France. He linked the situation to weapons rarely used for public order policing in several other European countries.

Amnesty International and other rights advocates want those weapons banned permanently. Saint-Denis Mayor Bally Bagayoko urged an end to rubber bullets to reduce tensions. Police union representative Thierry Clair argued that serious injuries should not lead to abandoning intermediate force options, which he considers necessary to protect officers during violent confrontations.