William M, 69, was placed under investigation on Monday for murder and attempted murder in connection with the killings in the 10th arrondissement of Paris which occurred last Friday.
The investigating judge indicted, this Monday afternoon, William M., the shooter of the shooting in the rue d’Enghien in the 10th arrondissement of Paris which left three dead and three injured last Friday.
While he admitted, during his hearings in police custody, to be the author of this attack, the 69-year-old former railway worker was indicted for several counts: assassinations, attempted assassinations due to the affiliation, real or supposed, of the victims to an alleged race, ethnicity, nation or religion, as well as for the illegal acquisition and possession of category B firearms. He faces a life sentence.
In the wake of his indictment, the man was presented to a judge of freedoms and detention who, at the request of the prosecution, decided on his placement in pre-trial detention.
William M. “will be placed in solitary confinement to protect him from the other detainees and he will be watched because there is a risk of suicide”, indicates Master Mourad Battikh. Indeed, during his hearings, the suspect confided that his only regret was not having succeeded in committing suicide “with the last bullet” of his Colt 45.
“A trial within 18 to 24 months”
The prison administration will therefore have to check the cell very regularly until “his trial in the next 18 to 24 months”, according to Maître Mourad Battikh.
The sexagenarian had already been arrested in December 2021 for attacking a migrant camp in the 12th arrondissement of the capital with a saber. Placed in pre-trial detention in the prison of Health, he was released on parole on December 12, pending a possible trial, the risk of recidivism having been deemed “limited”.
This time, the maximum duration of pre-trial detention, pending trial, may be longer than the previous one. “In criminal matters, when the penalty incurred is more than 20 years’ imprisonment, it is three years”, recalls public-life.
Before the hearing was ordered closed, William M. sat in the box, his left eye black, according to a BFMTV journalist present on the spot. Framed by five policemen, he was dressed in a blue shirt which seems to be a garment from a psychiatric hospital.
The national anti-terrorist prosecutor’s office did not take up the investigation
Since Friday, many political and militant voices have been rising up to ensure that this shooting, against a background of racism, be legally qualified as a terrorist act. But the national anti-terrorist prosecutor’s office (Pnat) did not take up the investigation.
“The documentation seized at [la perquisition] is not indicative of any link with an extremist ideology”, justified the Paris prosecutor’s office.
The seizure of the Pnat, however, has a direct impact on the legal outcome of the case, especially during the trial. “If it is the Pnat which is seized, the individual will go before an assize, criminal court. If it is the traditional prosecution, he will go before a popular jury. The security period will not be the same”, explained on BFMTV Master Mourad Battikh, lawyer at the Paris Bar, specialist in criminal law.
The duration of the security period – during which a convict cannot have a sentence adjustment – is half the sentence or, in the case of a sentence of life imprisonment, ten -eight years (which can go up to 22 years), according to Legifrance.
