PARIS | Seven people, including two minors, will be presented to an anti-terrorism judge on Wednesday with a view to opening a judicial investigation and possible indictments after the assassination on Friday near Paris of Professor Samuel Paty, AFP learned from a source judicial.
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Among them is Brahim C., the parent of a pupil who launched the mobilization against the teacher after two courses on freedom of expression given by Samuel Paty on October 5 and 6 in his college in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, at a twenty kilometers north-west of Paris.
Anti-terrorism investigators, who are looking for possible complicity, are particularly interested in messages exchanged on WhatsApp between this father and the assailant, Abdoullakh Anzorov, 18, a refugee of Chechen origin.
The sulphurous Islamist activist Abdelhakim Sefrioui, who had accompanied this parent of a student in his mobilization, will also be presented to a judge on Wednesday.
Also referred, two minors are suspected of having received money from the assailant in exchange for information on the victim.
A source close to the matter had explained to AFP on Monday that the decapitated teacher had been “appointed” to the assailant “by one or more schoolchildren, a priori against remuneration”.
Finally, three friends of the assailant, who had spontaneously surrendered to the police on Friday evening, must also be presented to a judge.
According to a source close to the file, one of them is suspected of having escorted the assailant, while another is suspected of having accompanied him during the purchase of a weapon that was used during his attack.
The custody of nine other people was however lifted Tuesday evening, without these people being prosecuted at this stage.
Among these people are three schoolchildren, the parents, the grandfather and the little brother of the murderer, but also the companion of Mr. Sefrioui as well as a man already convicted of terrorism and who was in contact with the assailant.
Around 5 p.m. on Friday, Abdoullakh Anzorov beheaded Samuel Paty, a history and geography teacher, near the college where he taught in a quiet area of Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, before being killed nine times by police in 200 meters away.
This professor had shown caricatures of Muhammad to his students in early October as part of a course on freedom of expression.
The anti-terrorism prosecution is due to hold a press conference in Paris on Wednesday at 2:30 p.m. (local time).