A deputy mayor of Saint-Denis, a popular municipality north of Paris, was brutally beaten in the street on Wednesday, an attack that sparked outrage on Thursday amid a nationwide rise in violence against elected officials.
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On Wednesday evening, Oriane Filhol, a socialist deputy mayor of the city, was leaving a work meeting and returning home when she felt several men following her on the street.
Ratrapée, responsible for solidarity and women's rights in the community, was thrown to the ground and then received kicks to the head and body. His attackers fled.
The injured woman had “no fracture or excessively serious injury,” Saint-Denis town hall told AFP.
The motive for the attack was “not immediately clear,” a police source told AFP. But the attack could be related to her status as an elected official, according to the Saint-Denis town hall, which constitutes an aggravating circumstance in criminal law.
“A complaint was immediately filed and the ongoing investigation will determine the exact reasons for this attack, which appears to be closely related to her involvement as an elected official,” the municipality said in a press release.
The attack on the deputy mayor sparked numerous reactions of solidarity and outrage in the department's political circles.
A demonstration in support of the victim will take place in front of Saint-Denis town hall on Friday.
Violence against elected officials is a sensitive issue that has gained prominence in the country in recent months.
Public opinion was dominated by the arson of the house of the mayor of Saint-Brevin (on the Atlantic coast) and, in particular, by the car attack that targeted the house and family of the mayor of L'Haÿ-les-Roses (on the Atlantic coast). Paris region) during last summer's unrest in France.
According to the Interior Department, attacks against elected officials increased by 32% last year (2,265 complaints and reports).
According to a survey published last month that polled almost 8,000 mayors in France, 69% of respondents said they had already been victims of rudeness (+16 points compared to 2020), 39% had suffered insults and insults ( +10 points) and 27% were attacked on social networks (+7 points), physical violence remained rare.