At least two French prison guards were shot dead and three others seriously injured on Tuesday during the violent attack on a police van carrying an escaped prisoner, French police said. The orchestrated attack that takes place in a context of increasing violence related to drug trafficking across Europe it took place at a highway toll booth in the Eure region, an hour northwest of Paris. Four armed men broke into two vehicles and attacked the convoy of two vans carrying the detainee, who was recently convicted and prosecuted for murder.
According to police, the prisoner and the attackers fled. The Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, has indicated that an intensive manhunt has been launched to catch those responsible. “All resources are being used to find these criminals. On my instructions, several hundred police officers and gendarmes have been mobilized,” he wrote on the social network X. About 200 officers are taking part in the operation.
President, Emmanuel Macron, has regretted “the attack” that cost the lives of the guards. “The nation stands with the families, the injured and their colleagues. “Everything possible is being done to find the perpetrators of this crime so that justice is done in the name of the French people,” he said on social media. For his part, the Minister of Justice, Éric Dupond-Moretti, has detailed that two of the injured officers are in critical condition. “Absolutely everything possible will be done to find the perpetrators of this despicable crime,” he told BFM-TV. “These are people for whom life means nothing. They will be arrested, tried and punished according to the crime they committed,” he assured.
The attack on this matin, which shared the lives of the officers of the penitentiary administration, is a shock to all of us.
The Nation lies between the families, the blessings and the colleagues.
There are many mistakes in the work of retroactive authors of the crime…
— Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) May 14, 2024
Several roads are closed to traffic and all vehicles driving on them are searched. According to local media, the escaped detainee is a 30-year-old criminal, identified as Mohamed A., who was sentenced last Tuesday to 18 months in prison for several robberies committed under aggravating circumstances in 2019. In addition, he was prosecuted for an attempted murder committed in the Rouen area, where the escape took place, and for a voluntary murder committed in 2022 near Marseille, as part of an investigation into drug trafficking. According to the BFM-TV television network, he returned to the Evreux prison center, where he was serving his sentence, after being questioned by judges in the morning over the attempted murder near Rouen.
Images circulated on social media showed at least two men wearing balaclavas and carrying guns circling near an SUV that was on fire. The SUV appeared to have rammed into the front of the prison van. Drug-related crime has exploded across Europe and has been awash with cocaine in recent years. Marseille, in the south of the country, has been the epicenter of gang violence in France, with a particularly violent war between trading clans.
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