A year after riots, France continues probe into police shooting of teenager

Investigations into the police shooting of Nahel Merzouk are still ongoing – a year after the teenager was killed during a traffic stop in a Paris suburb. The death set off a week of protests and rioting causing damage to towns across France. People in the suburbs where much of the violence took place say they feel abandoned.

A year ago, on 27 June 2023, 17-year-old Merzouk was shot in the chest at point-blank range in Nanterre by a police officer during a traffic stop – an event that was captured on video, but whose circumstances remain contested.

The officer, Florian M, who was charged with voluntary homicide two days after the shooting and was detained until November says he fired his gun because he feared for his life.

Two investigative magistrates tasked with determining if this was the case have spent months interviewing witnesses and organising crime scene re-enactments.

After one re-enactment in May, Merzouk's mother's lawyer said it showed that the police officer was not in danger, whereas a lawyer for the officer said that while his client was not in actual danger of being run over by Merzouk's car “he could have felt like he could have been”.

Police violence

Investigations are also ongoing into police violence during the protests and riots in the week after, which left two people dead and more than 1,000 wounded. About 2,500 buildings were damaged in 627 cities and towns across France.

Some 45,000 police officers were mobilised, and the police's internal disciplinary body, the IGPN, is investigating about 40 cases of police violence.

“The investigations are moving very slowly,” Arié Alimi, the lawyer representing several victims, told RFI.

He said the incidents happened amidst chaos, without much video evidence, and IGPN is the only service that can investigate.

“They are overwhelmed, and it is structurally complex for police officers to investigate police officers,” he said.

“It takes a long time to appoint judges to carry out the investigations, so it means there is a minimum of five to 10 years. We are just at the very beginning.”

Simmering anger

The rioting caused nearly a billion euros in damage across France, and a Senate report found that most of those involved were very young and had various motivations.

Fewer than 10 percent of those involved in the rioting said they did so as a reaction to Merzouk's death, or even to protest police violence in general.

Lawmakers said participants expressed anger "towards the institutions and representatives of public authority", and its violent expression was “fed by a feeling of exclusion”, which was amplified by social media.

Anger remains in many suburban towns where marks of the riots remain even a year later.

In Asnières-sur-Seine, a few kilometers north of Nanterre, where Merzouk was killed, rioters burned the courthouse.

“Roads are still burnt, the post office has not been renovated with fire-proof doors,” Zouhair Ech Chetouani, a youth mediator and fixture in the north of the town, told RFI.

Nahel's death the 'last straw'

Chetouani said that Merzouk's death was the last straw for young people tired of seeing their suburbs ignored.

“When you talk to young people and you ask where [the anger] comes from, they do not speak about Nahel. They speak mostly about the lack of public and community services in their neighborhood, the lack of dialogue, the lack of activities,” he said.

“Nothing has changed, nothing has helped young people,” a 26-year-old man, who did not want to be identified, said about his neighbourhood in the last year.

Since the riots, community groups have shut down, and people feel like they have no support, even from the mayor.

“We only see him during electoral periods,” said the man. “Why does he not come to see things here?”

For Chetouani, the only response from the authorities has been a crackdown by police, and he worries about the next revolt, which he says could be even more violent than in 2023.