On Monday 2 September, a new national tribute was held at the Ausseur barracks in Nice for officer Eric Comyn, who was fatally wounded by a driver during a roadside check. The outgoing Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, presided over the tribute after meeting the family of the chief petty officer, in particular his widow, Harmonie Comyn, and his two children.
Gérald Darmanin expressed the “shock” and the“tremendous anger” which followed the death of the gendarme, saluting the memory of a “everyday hero”of a “anonymous full of virtues”. “If death is part of the life of a gendarme, of a policeman, if it is part of the uniform, the conditions are not all acceptable. The death of Eric Comyn is not acceptable.”, continuous.
“This is not a refusal to comply, it is a crime. It is not news, it is a social fact”The minister insisted, in a speech addressed directly to the aide’s widow, who had expressed her wish that he preside over this tribute after having expressed her anger during a previous ceremony. “The death of her husband shocks and disgusts us”continuous. “It is a new, repeated, strident and disturbing message, which must be heard and translated everywhere, in all decision-making forces”promised the minister, who asked “not only justice for the criminal, but justice for society.”
Posthumous decorations
Gérald Darmanin posthumously awarded Eric Comyn several decorations, including the Legion of Honour. After the speech and the presentation of medals, a minute of silence was observed at the site and in all the prefectures and gendarmes of France. Although Eric Comyn’s funeral was not open to the public, many people were expected to come to the barracks to pay their respects to the gendarme’s memory.
During a ceremony held on Wednesday in Mandelieu-la-Napoule, where the motorized platoon to which her husband belonged was stationed, Harmonie Comyn accused ” France “ have “delicate [son] husband for his inadequacyhis laxity and his excess of tolerance ». “Why can this repeat offender move around freely? When will our legislators really open their eyes? Do they have to be directly affected to act? How many deaths will there be before these murderers are truly punished?”asked.
The tragedy occurred on Monday 26 August at around 8.40pm, when a person driving a black BMW refused to stop, according to the gendarmerie. The vehicle violently ran over Eric Comyn while he and his colleagues were carrying out a routine traffic check on an exit ramp of the A8 motorway. A non-commissioned officer, a member of the gendarmerie’s motorised platoon, he was 54 years old and the father of two children.
Arrested in Cannes at around 4am on Monday morning, approximately eight hours after the incident, the suspect had a positive alcohol level. He was then brought before an investigating judge, charged in particular with “murder of a public official” and placed in preventive detention. He already has ten convictions on his criminal record and has been arrested twice for drunk and/or drug driving.
