The images had created a wave of indignation on social networks. After the broadcast of a video showing a person beaten by two men, obviously plainclothes police, on Sunday in Marseille, an investigation into "willful violence committed in a meeting and by a person holding public authority" was opened on Tuesday March 21 and entrusted to the General Inspectorate of the National Police (IGPN).
"At this time, the prosecution has not received a complaint in this case," said the city prosecutor's office, confirming information from the newspaper Liberation.
Punches, kicks in the face
The scene took place during the police evacuation, at the beginning of the evening, of the independent carnival of the Plain, a festive and militant event taking place every year in the city center of Marseille. The video was posted Sunday evening on Twitter by a journalist from the daily La Provence. We see a person on the ground, prostrate against a car, being hit several times, with his fists, by a standing man while another, on his knees, seems to hold her to the ground and also hits her, hitting her even a kick in the face. According to Liberation, it could be agents of the anti-crime brigade (BAC). Right next to it, CRS in uniform, armed with batons and shields, do not intervene.
The scene was also filmed from another angle, from a balcony. There too, we see the victim, on the ground, who cries out in pain, a rush of blows. BFM Marseille's cameras also captured this incident, which occurs after a CRS charge.
At the end of a day of festivities without incident, the police intervened in the early evening on the square to disperse a group of revelers who, according to them, engaged in "degradation" and adopted "hostile behavior".
During this intervention, twenty-five police officers were very slightly injured and twenty people arrested, according to a report released Monday by the Bouches-du-Rhône police headquarters.
