Three French Police Officers to Stand Trial Over 2020 Assault on Music Producer Michel Zecler, Digi Mart USA News (Paris, France): Aurélien B., Pierre P. and Philippe T., now aged 29, 37 and 50, are accused of intentional violence committed jointly and falsifying an official document by a person holding public authority.
They face up to 15 years in prison. A fourth police officer is to be tried before a correctional court.
The trial before the Paris criminal court is expected to last two weeks. Michel Zecler, a 47-year-old music producer, says he feels a mix of “apprehension” and “anger” ahead of it.
Six years after the events, he hopes his attackers will be “judged to the level of their actions.”
On November 21, 2020, during France’s second national lockdown amid the Covid-19 health crisis, Zecler was stopped by a police patrol outside his Paris music studio for not wearing a mask and on suspicion of cannabis use. Pushed by the officers into the narrow entrance vestibule of his premises, he was subjected to a very violent beating, recorded by the studio’s surveillance camera.
The investigation described it as “an avalanche of blows.”
Between 7:42 p.m. and 7:47 p.m., the producer was struck about thirty times on the face and across his body with fists and batons.
The medical examination recorded a craniofacial trauma, a wound to the lip and scalp, and a complete rupture of the biceps tendon, resulting in 45 days of total work incapacity.
The footage, first revealed by the website Loopsider six days after the incident, caused shock. President Emmanuel Macron spoke of “shame” and the images contradicted the officers’ account.
Their arrest report stated that Zecler had struck them and tried to seize a baton.
“If there had not been cameras… their reports would have been enough to send me to prison, for a long time,” Zecler said, adding that he remains deeply affected and still wonders about how easily he was attacked.
“I don’t understand this hatred,” he told AFP. He regularly attends trials involving police officers and says he is “frightened” by the “images of violence” seen during recent demonstrations in France.
The case reignited debate over violence and racism in the police, which victims and researchers describe as systemic, while the institution and police unions consider such acts isolated. The officers were suspended, and two of them were detained for one month.
During the investigation they acknowledged that their report did not match the facts, but said they feared for their lives and denied any racial motive. Zecler states he was called a “sale nègre” during the beating.
Without questioning his sincerity, the court found insufficient evidence to establish racism as a qualification.
“I was insulted. And I will say it again at the hearing,” the producer said.
The November 2020 attack upended his life, “physically, morally, economically too,” he said. He continues to receive psychological support, and his physical pain “resurfaces, especially at this time of year, because it sadly reminds me of what I went through.”
Lawyers for the officers declined to comment when contacted by AFP.
