Philippe, 22, died from his injuries on Tuesday April 16. He had been beaten the previous night in Grande-Synthe (North). An investigation is open.
What happened on the night of Monday April 15 to Tuesday April 16, 2024 in Grande-Synthe (North)? This is what the judicial police in charge of the investigation opened after the beating of Philippe, 22, found unconscious in a parking lot behind the Carrefour Contact store in the town of 20,000 inhabitants are trying to find out. . Initially opened for attempted murder by an organized gang, the investigation was reclassified as murder by an organized gang following the death of Philippe on Tuesday evening, relays The Parisian.
“According to the first elements, the acts could have been committed by at least three individuals”, indicated in a press release the public prosecutor of Dunkirk, Charlotte Huet, who specified that “the investigations are continuing actively in order to identify all the accused and clarify the circumstances of the commission of the facts”, reports Le Figaro. According to information from Parisian, two minors were reportedly arrested, one on Tuesday, the other on Wednesday morning. One of them would be 14 years old.
An attack of rare violence
While Le Figaro on Wednesday put forward the possibility of an ambush, orchestrated via social networks, several other media, including The Parisian, report that Philippe was attacked while he was simply returning home. On the phone with this employee of a socio-educational center in Grande-Synthe at the time of his attack, a friend of Philippe had a quick exchange with one of the attackers before the latter ended the conversation by hanging up. It was this friend who would have alerted Philippe’s relatives so that they could go looking for him in the middle of the night.
Discovered unconscious, the unfortunate man presented “several traces of blows, particularly to the face”. Philippe was immediately transported to Dunkirk hospital before being sent to the Lille hospital center. “He was at his friend’s house at the end of my street. He came back towards my house, 200 meters ago, 300 meters maximum. And they caught him on the way,” revealed one of the victim’s brothers this Wednesday afternoon at RTL. And the second brother, Dylan, added: “What we know is that he was pulled towards the Carrefour, behind the parking lot. They must have finished the job there.”
A gang already known to law enforcement?
Confident that he had little additional information, the first brother, Kelvin, explained that the individuals would have only hit his brother “in the face”. “But if he died from blows to the head, it’s because they were strong and they hit him well,” he said. The victim’s brother also revealed that during the attack, Philippe’s phone as well as “personal belongings” were stolen. And to confide about the attackers: “This gang has made several attacks that they are trying to commit in Grande-Synthe.”
At the end of the day on Wednesday, the city’s mayor, Martial Beyaert, held a press conference during which he condemned the political exploitation of this sad affair. “Grande-Synthe is not a lawless zone”, he pleaded, denouncing in passing the “exactions of the fascist on social networks”, relays France Blue. Regarding the victim, Martial Beyaert spoke of a young man “very favorably known in the town”. And to detail: “He had worked after-school, in the school canteen and was to start a contract on Berg’s Amazon platform. He was perfectly integrated socially.”
After obtaining the agreement of Philippe’s two brothers, the councilor also announced that a white march would be organized on Friday April 19, at 11 a.m. She will leave from Noordover high school. Earlier in the day, the mayor of the town had already expressed his emotion on Facebook and shared the prize pool link launched by the victim’s relatives to help the family pay for the funeral.