Sunday August 13, 2023, at dawn, three people died in the fire of a five-storey building on the square in Aires de Grasse, a town in the Alpes-Maritimes department. two people had perished in the flames that ravaged the stairwell of the building and another, who had probably jumped out of a window to try to escape the fire, was found unresponsive by firefighters in front of the building. The emergency services had also counted three seriously injured. Monday August 14, 2023, the 47-year-old suspect with no criminal record was taken into custody. If he denied any involvement in the occurrence of the facts, he went back on his remarks on Tuesday August 15, 2023, announced the public prosecutor of Grasse in a press release relayed by the journalists of BFM TV. The man admitted the facts “but unintentionally”. At his last audition, the respondent mentioned “the throw of an unextinguished cigarette in the entrance hall of the building”.
The prosecution requests pre-trial detention
If the man had denied the facts, the public prosecutor of Grasse reported that he had nevertheless been placed in police custody on Sunday August 13, 2023. Indeed, he had been arrested at 8:35 p.m. after “the operation of the video protection of the city” made it possible to identify “an individual leaving the building two minutes before the cameras detected the start of a fire”. The public prosecutor of Grasse explained in his press release that “the examination carried out during police custody [du suspect] concludes, at this stage, the full criminal responsibility of the person implicated”. As a result, the police custody of the forties was lifted on Tuesday August 15, 2023 at 2 p.m. He must be referred to the Grasse public prosecutor’s office, with a view to opening a judicial investigation into the heads of willful damage by fire having caused death, willful damage by fire having caused permanent disability, willful damage by fire having caused an interruption total work over eight days and intentional damage caused by fire. The prosecution will request pre-trial detention. He remains presumed innocent.