Fatal police interventions: “No prosecution or fine can ever justify ruining a life”
Hi, this is Luc from the vis team! A bill voted on in the French National Assembly last week will, if confirmed by the Senate, transform the legal framework that governs the use of force by law enforcement officers. This news prompted me to research the figures on the number of people killed by law enforcement in France.
Official statistics on lethal use of force by law enforcement are hard to find. The French Internal Affairs (IGPN) recently started publishing statistics on police fatalities (like here for 2022), but there are no official historical numbers. Fortunately, the independent media outlet Basta! has compiled historical figures based on media reports, research, testimonials, and other sources. In the United States, similar statistics are computed by the Washington Post.
The chart above shows that the number of deaths linked to the use of force by the police has risen in recent years, faster than population growth, especially after 2017, the year when a law was enacted that relaxes the rules governing police and gendarme use of firearms, including the option to fire at the occupants of fleeing vehicles. Researchers found lethal shootings at moving vehicles increased almost fivefold comparing the periods before and after the law.
Emblematic cases sometimes make the headlines, such as the death of Adama Traoré in July 2016, whose family asserts it was due to a police officer applying prone restraint, a tragic story reminiscent of the murder of George Floyd in the U.S. The death of Nahel Merzouk in 2023, killed by a gunshot during a car control, was captured on video and caused great outrage.
Following philosopher Geoffroy de Lagasnerie, talking of “police violence” is redundant, since the very reason for the existence of police is violence, a violence generally accepted within the framework of the social contract where state violence is used to prevent more violence in society. Counterterrorism operations, for instance. In France, the killing of the Kouachi brothers after they attacked Charlie Hebdo in 2015 is the perfect example. In fact, 27 of the 861 cases reported by Basta! fall into that category.
The bill passed last week by the Assemblée Nationale, by a coalition from the governing party of Emmanuel Macron to the far-right Rassemblement National, establishes a presumption of lawful use for any use of force by a law enforcement officer. The conditions of lawful use of force remain unchanged, but the burden of proof now falls on others, i.e., the victims of police violence themselves.
Amnesty International called this regulation a “license to kill” for law enforcement officers. According to jurist Olivier Cahn, the fundamental change is that a law enforcement officer who has killed someone cannot be immediately taken into custody, which gives them time to coordinate the account of the events with witnesses. Given that two-thirds of cases involving deaths following police intervention already do not result in any trial, this law will add yet another obstacle to uncovering the truth, and it could further increase the number of deaths following police intervention.
The new law is now pending Senate approval. I really hope the members of parliament will follow the head of the Gendarmerie’s statement that “No prosecution or fine can ever justify ruining a life”.
