“I say it loud and clear: France killed my husband.” On the occasion of the tribute paid to her late husband in Mandelieu-la-Napoule (Alpes-Maritimes), Between stifled sobs, Harmonie Comyn denounced the“insufficiency”HE “laxity” AND “excess tolerance” She says that she was responsible for his death. Sergeant Eric Comyn, 54, was killed after refusing to obey orders on Monday 26 August during a checkpoint on the A8 motorway near Mougins (Alpes-Maritimes).
m’s complaintsme Comyn points to the profile of the driver accused of having run over the gendarme. The defendant, a Cape Verdean national, is already 39 years old, according to the Grasse prosecutor, and already has ten court convictions. According to a source from the Ministry of the Interior, he was known to the police since 2006 for acts of violence, but also for refusing to comply with a hit-and-run in 2012, driving without a license in 2014 and driving under the influence of drunkenness in 2023.
He tested positive for alcohol again, a few hours after killing the non-commissioned officer of the motorized gendarmerie platoon of Mandelieu-la-Napoule. “How can this repeat offender move around freely? How many deaths before these murderers are truly punished?”asked the widow of this non-commissioned officer, father of two children.
“We need to change the software”
Questioned the day after the gendarme’s death, the resigning Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, recalled the number of refusals to comply: “There are a lot of them, an average of 25,000 a year.” In a report published in April, the Ministerial Service of Statistics for Internal Security (SSMSI) detailed its evolution over the past eight years. “The number of traffic denials recorded increased by 12% between 2016 and 2021. (…)before decreasing by 15% from 2021 to 2023”to fall to 23,100.
The percentage of these refusals that endanger other people followed the same trend: the SSMSI recorded 3,800 in 2016, 5,500 in 2021 and 4,400 in 2023. “Nowadays, the most dangerous mission we can do is control vehicles”, says Grégory Joron, secretary general of Un1té, formerly Unité-SGP Police-FO. In detail, in 2023, 500 refusals to comply seriously endangered the police wishing to carry out an inspection.
The day after the death of Petty Officer Comyn, the president of the Republicans, Eric Ciotti, announced that he would submit a bill to toughen the penalties imposed for refusal to comply, a position shared by the elected representatives of the National Rally. In particular, he proposes increasing the prison sentence from two to three years and doubling the fine to 30,000 euros. “We have already tightened the laws and it has not had any magical effect.” —says Gregory Joron.
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