In Toulouse, a man arrested after depositing an “explosive device” in the cathedral
It only took a few hours for the Toulouse judicial police to arrest, on Friday April 8, a man suspected of having filed a “explosive engine” craftsmanship in the Saint-Etienne cathedral in Toulouse, early in the morning. He was placed in police custody at the beginning of the afternoon, confirmed to the World the prosecutor of Toulouse, Samuel Vuelta Simon.
Known to the police for driving while intoxicated, contempt of an officer, use of narcotics, this 47-year-old man had already been implicated, according to the prosecution, in other cases and twice declared criminally irresponsible, Due to “psychiatric problems”. The National Anti-Terrorist Prosecutor’s Office did not take up the case and the investigation was entrusted to the Toulouse judicial police.
The facts took place around 8:30 am when the daily mass ends under the high vaults of the Saint-Etienne cathedral, eleven days before Easter and two days before the first round of the presidential election. “A man came in with a package under his arm during communion, I took him for a delivery man. He crossed the nave and deposited the package in front of the altar steps. He shoved me, he said something incomprehensible and he left”says the sexton, Aurélien Dreux.
No “firing device”
The sexton immediately asked the faithful to evacuate the premises. “Father Jean-Jacques Rouchy, who was celebrating this mass, went to warn the police on duty in front of the prefecture”, specifies for his part the Abbé Simon d’Artigue, parish priest of the cathedral, which adjoins the regional prefecture. “There were about forty people present”details the father of Artigue.
Very quickly, the neighborhood was cordoned off by numerous police forces. In the cathedral, the deminers discovered two parcels placed at the foot of the altar. One of them contained an explosive device qualified as “very amateur”. According to the prosecution, “one of the bags did contain hydrochloric acid and aluminum, without a firing device. Products that can easily be found on the market”.
Very quickly, CCTV images were published by The Midi Dispatch, showing the fleeing man, wearing a gray cap and a clear surgical mask, and dressed in a black parka and blue jeans. He was arrested shortly after, around 1:30 p.m.
In a press release, the Archbishop of Toulouse, Guy de Kerimel, a convict “develop this act” and “regrets that a place of prayer and its faithful are targeted by an explosive device”. He called on Catholics to “celebrating Holy Week with confidence”.
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