The author of the knife attack at the Reims University Hospital admitted the facts in police custody. The man would suffer from “severe disorders” and spoke of a desire for revenge against the medical profession. One of the two stabbed caregivers died.
“I have just learned with immense sadness of the death of Carène, a 38-year-old nurse who was violently attacked yesterday at the CHU de Reims”. These are the words written by the Minister of Health, François Braun, this Tuesday, May 23, the day after the knife attack which targeted two women at the Reims hospital center. The caregiver was in a very critical condition yesterday after her attack by a patient. The second person attacked, a 56-year-old medical secretary, is still hospitalized in serious condition but his life prognosis is not engaged.
I have just learned with great sadness of the death of Carène, a 38-year-old nurse who was violently attacked yesterday at @CHUdeReims. My thoughts are with his loved ones, his colleagues, as well as all the bereaved hospital teams this morning.
— Francois Braun (@FrcsBraun) May 23, 2023
What happened at the Reims University Hospital?
It was in the early afternoon of Monday May 22, around 1:30 p.m., that the two women were attacked with a knife by a 59-year-old patient. The man had presented himself a little earlier to the service of the unit of “medicine and health at work” of the CHU of Reims and attacked the nurse and the medical secretary in a locker room. The attacker tried to flee but was intercepted in his run by security guards and immediately arrested by the police. The public prosecutor of Reims announced Monday evening that the fifty-year-old had been placed in police custody earlier in the day, from 1:40 p.m., “for the facts of attempted assassination”. The central police station in Reims is in charge of the investigation and the first confessions of the suspect have been obtained.
Psychiatric disorders, revenge… Who is the suspect?
The author of the knife attack at the Reims University Hospital is a 59-year-old man from Reims with a “psychiatric history”, according to the details of the Minister of Health, François Braun. The prosecutor himself spoke of “severe disorders” and mentioned the “reinforced curatorship measures” taken for several years with regard to the suspect.
Placed in police custody, the man admitted to resenting the hospital staff after being mistreated for years in psychiatric services, reports franceinfo. In front of the police, the aggressor also assured that he wanted to “take revenge” at each meeting with a caregiver. It is unclear whether the attack at the Reims University Hospital was premeditated or not, but according to the prosecutor’s press release, the suspect “seems to have acted without apparent motive, especially since he had no appointment in this service”.
The 59-year-old man had already been indicted in the past in Châlons-en-Champagne “for acts of aggravated violence” according to information from BFM TV. He then “benefited in June 2022 from a dismissal order for criminal irresponsibility, and this case was soon to be referred to the investigating chamber of the Reims Court of Appeal to rule on the security measures. likely to be taken”.