Louis De Raguenel and William Molinié, with AFP
, modified at
4:48 p.m., December 21, 2021
The police put an end this Tuesday morning to the hostage-taking which took place in a grocery store in the 12th arrondissement of Paris and which began Monday in the middle of the afternoon. Two women were kidnapped by a man known in the district to have mental disorders. Monday, shortly before 10 p.m., one of the hostages was released. The hostage taker was arrested by the police, and the second woman was finally released unharmed.
This Tuesday morning around 8.15 am, negotiations ended between the hostage taker and the police since the man surrendered and was arrested by the men of the BRI, calmly. The individual was immediately placed in police custody. He was subsequently admitted to the psychiatric infirmary of the Paris police headquarters. Negotiations had never ceased throughout the night from Monday to Tuesday. The second hostage was freed safe and sound, and there were no casualties in the operation.
According to a person close to the investigation, Tuesday morning, the prefect of police Didier Lallement spoke to the madman by telephone.
Rue d’Aligre in # Paris12 | The madman has just freed one of the hostages, who is unharmed. Negotiations are still ongoing by the BIS. pic.twitter.com/VH8IOPCtkR
– Police Prefecture (@prefpolice) December 20, 2021
It would not be a former magistrate
On Monday, the man with a bladed weapon, who had been holding two women since the afternoon in a shop in the 12th arrondissement in Paris, released one of them unharmed, as announced by the police headquarters on Twitter. “The madman has just freed one of the hostages, who is unharmed. Negotiations are still ongoing” with the Research and Intervention Brigade (BRI), tweeted the Prefecture of Police.
The author, a 56-year-old man known for a psychiatric history, had entered around 3:20 p.m. in a bazaar in the rue d’Aligre, near the Bastille district, where he had taken two women hostage. According to our information, it would not be a former magistrate. If this identity could be evoked at the beginning of the investigation, the doubt was raised because it was about a homonym. Also according to our information, the lawyer Sylvie Noachovitch had been put in touch with the madman to reason with him. The latter has no claim in the Raddad case but he said he only trusted her.
The terrorist trail was quickly ruled out, according to a police source. An investigation was opened including the head of “kidnapping” and was entrusted to the police station of the 12th arrondissement, confirmed the Paris prosecutor’s office.