They had the wrong target: in Montpellier, six men tried for trying to kill the sweeper of a nightclub

The scene took place in front of the nightclub, around 6 a.m. Midi Libre – JEAN MICHEL MART

All deny having lynched and stabbed a warehouse maintenance worker on August 30, 2019 in Lattes, in retaliation for a previous altercation that occurred a few days earlier in this Lattes night establishment, close to the A 709. They risk thirty years of criminal imprisonment.

"I played dead hoping that would make them stop. They were blows to hurt me, to kill me, they were blows to the throat." On August 30, 2019, an agent of  rsquo;maintenance busy cleaning the surroundings of the Entrepôt nightclub, in the Puech Radier district in Lattes, just next to the A 709 motorway, thought its last hour was coming . While he is sweeping the area around the nightclub, which closed earlier in the night, several men who arrived by car pounce on him and go on a rampage. Punches, kicks, but also knives: he is hit in the throat, and bleeds enormously.

"He put a tourniquet around his neck"

"He understood that he did not have time to wait for help, and that if he did not go to the emergency room on his own, he would die. He put a tourniquet on his neck, and took his car" says Me Anne Sévenier, his lawyer.

He came away with a month of ITT and profound psychological trauma, having had such a close brush with death, without the slightest reason.

Because the investigation has established it: it is certainly by mistake, because of its Senegalese origins and a possible resemblance with the nightclub bouncer, that this man, who had also been disabled since childhood by poliomyelitis, was thus targeted in the first light of dawn.

A server slapped four days ago

Four days earlier, a group of partygoers had caused an incident inside the Warehouse, with one of them slapping a waiter, then showing off a knife. : they were then very firmly expelled by the physiognomists.

A few hours after this attempted murder, the gendarmes burst into a villa in Villeneuve-lès-Maguelone, rented for the holidays, and arrested nine men, who were placed in police custody. Originally from the Paris region, most of them deny having gone to the Warehouse that morning, even if examination of their telephone numbers will reveal that some were close to it at the time. moment of the attack.

All deny having participated in the facts

The investigation, based on the examination of the video surveillance images which filmed the scene, the account of the victim and several witnesses, implicated six suspects, five being prosecuted for attempted murder , and a sixth for complicity. Two of them will appear detained before the Assize Court of Hérault, and all deny having participated in this savage vengeance.

"There is nothing determining which allows& rsquo;involve each other. This case is very vague in terms of responsibilities" believes Me Luc Abratkiewicz, who defends one of the accused.

"It’is the trial of gratuitous violence and blind cruelty" replies Me Sévenier. "Even when he faked his death, they continued to beat him."

The trial is scheduled to last two weeks, with a verdict expected on May 30.

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