Besançon police video political remarks, Digi Mart USA News (Besançon, France): A video of just over three minutes, received by the Est Républicain newspaper on Sunday morning, shows a police officer making political remarks and sexist comments during an identity check in Besançon, in the Franche-Comté region of eastern France. The footage was first posted on a Signal discussion thread before being shared by local citizen channels, then partially by opposition communist councillor Hasni Alem, and finally in full by the local outlet Le Ch’ni.
According to the newspaper, the video was filmed on Saturday, November 7, around 6 p.m., on rue de la Madeleine in front of the Chaos thrift shop, during the fourth day of a protest movement against the high cost of living. Other shopkeepers in the area told the newspaper that police did intervene at that location in the afternoon.
The woman who filmed the video, whom the newspaper could not reach, was recording an arrest when a police officer with a shield moved in front of her.
In the footage, the officer announces an identity check and addresses her condescendingly as “ma petite dame” and “mademoiselle,” although she asks to be called “madame.” Aware that he is being filmed, the helmeted officer responds with obscene and sexist remarks: “You can film, masturbate tonight, do what you want!” When she objects that his remarks are disgusting, a second officer, with his face uncovered, asks what she was filming and tells her, “We’re fed up with people who film.”
The second officer searches her handbag and checks her driver’s license, sighing, “You’re wearing me out. If you knew the contempt I have for people like you.
But you’ll see, a day is coming soon. Things are going to change.” When the woman says she believes he votes for the National Rally, he replies, “Oh no!
They’re leftists to me! Reconquête, I’m a royalist!” The video ends as officers prepare to conduct a pat-down search.
On social media, Hasni Alem, who reposted the excerpt concerning Reconquête, denounced “facts of exceptional gravity” and “unacceptable remarks,” calling for an investigation. Citing article R434-29 of the French Internal Security Code and article L.121-2 of the General Civil Service Code, which require officers to refrain from expressing political, philosophical or religious convictions while on duty, he described the conduct as outright provocation.
When the prefecture was asked about the video mid-day, which it said it had not previously seen, it referred questions to the national police. Laurent Perraut, the interdepartmental director of the national police for the Doubs department, said late in the day that authorities were awaiting an official transmission of the video in order to authenticate it and determine the circumstances.
He said that if the remarks were confirmed, they could be subject to an administrative inquiry, and that all consequences could follow.
Digi Mart USA News has not independently verified the video; the account relies on the reporting of the publisher.
