Night has barely fallen in the Maurepas neighborhood of Rennes when the shutters of the surrounding buildings are closed, on Monday, October 28. The neighbors hide in an unusual silence. At the foot of the fifteen-story bars built in the 60s, several CRS82 vans. Officials from this company specialized in maintaining order were urgently sent to Maurepas, currently in the middle of a territorial war between drug traffickers. “This police presence should reassure the population that wants to live in peace. “Safety is at the center of our priorities”insists Amaury de Saint-Quentin, prefect of Brittany, visiting the neighborhood at the end of the evening. In office for only a few hours, Bruno Retailleau, Minister of the Interior, asked him to make the ” war “ to “drug scum that controls this neighborhood.”
Rennes, often described as a city where life is good, has not escaped the explosion of violence orchestrated by drug traffickers. On the last weekend of October, Maurepas was the epicenter of an unprecedented wave in the Breton capital. It all started on Saturday, October 26, in the morning when gunshots were heard. According to the Rennes prosecutor’s office, a group of hooded men, one of whom carries a submachine gun-type weapon, wanders between the towers. The RAID intervenes to stop what seems like a new confrontation between rival gangs competing for a deal.
Later that same night, a 29-year-old man left the neighborhood driving his car. In the back seat, his 5-year-old son. According to the first elements of the investigation, the driver, known to the police, felt threatened while heading towards Vezin-le-Coquet, on the outskirts of Rennes, to “shelter” his son with the latter’s mother and hide there. On the way, the man notices that a vehicle is following him. There are several men on board, at least one of them armed. Then a chase begins to Pacé, a quiet and wealthy town in the Rennes metropolitan area. Shots ring out. The boy received two blows to the head. The attackers flee. Emergency services intervene and take the victim to hospital. The boy was operated on twice. His vital prognosis was still in danger on Monday night, according to the prefecture.
This shooting marks “a new level in the violence and horror generated by drug trafficking”, reacts to the World Nathalie Appéré, mayor (Socialist Party, PS) of Rennes. “Since Covid, drug trafficking is more powerful and better organized. It is growing at a phenomenal speed throughout the national territory. The uninhibited violence of the bandits no longer has limits.”The councilor is alarmed. If this episode is very moving in the Breton capital, it does not surprise Maurepas. Here, drug trafficking marks the lives of some 6,000 residents.
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