A house exploded in La Chapelle, in the Allier, at the time of an intervention by the gendarmes. This is the residence of a man they came to arrest.
[Mise à jour le 15 mars à 16h59] The tranquility of the small village of La Chapelle (Allier) was shattered this Wednesday March 15, 2023, at the very beginning of the afternoon. Around 1 p.m., the firefighters were called to intervene on a fire that broke out in a house in this village of less than 400 souls. An innocuous operation? In appearance only. Because inside there are four people: the resident of the premises and three gendarmes. The latter had come to challenge the first, when his home exploded. The trio of soldiers was seriously injured in the flames, including one for whom the vital prognosis is committed. The man they were looking for, on the other hand, died on the spot. In addition, four other gendarmes, present outside the house, were injured by the explosion. These members of the police are attached to the Surveillance and Intervention Platoon of the Vichy gendarmerie – for the three in serious condition – and to the Mayet-de-Montagne brigade for the other four. Have they fallen into an ambush?
The already known man
According to information obtained by a journalist from M6the deceased was “unfavorably known” to the courts. The mountain specifies that he is a 38-year-old man, who already had 10 entries on his criminal record for various convictions. The individual was on probation. BFM TV recounts that, for several days, the 30-year-old had been making death threats by telephone against an agent of the SPIP, that is to say an agent responsible for monitoring the reintegration of a convicted man. Faced with these remarks, the order had been given by the prosecution to arrest him.
At this stage, the origin of the explosion is not yet known. However, “the question that arises is whether we are dealing with a person who was waiting for the gendarmes and who wanted to kill. The only constant element is that there was a strong smell of gasoline when the forces of the order intervened”, specified the prosecutor to The mountain. The gendarmes had all the same managed to penetrate inside the man’s home, to arrest him and handcuff him indicates BFM TV. The explosion then occurred. As the house caught fire, the four gendarmes who remained outside intervened but failed to save the man they had come to arrest. The research section of the Clermont gendarmerie was in charge of the investigation, opened for attempted homicide on a person holding public authority.