Security. The night the mayor of Lyon did not respond to the authorities, the story of a rupture
An additional quarrel is looming between the City of Lyon and the authorities. It hasn’t burst yet, but it is watching. In town, trees have grown and are beginning to obscure the view of some CCTV cameras. Investigators have noticed this in recent cases. Deprived of useful images, they do not yet dare to ask the environmentalist executive to prune a few trees for the needs of the police.
However, this is neither a joke nor a provocation. The atmosphere is already sufficiently leaden. Misunderstandings accumulate between the State services and the municipality, against a backdrop of political postures and reciprocal accusations.
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“In a partnership, everyone must play their part. If one partner achieves results and the other does not, then it is no longer really a partnership,” warns the Prefecture in a recent press release. The tension reached an unprecedented climax on September 15. Never had a prefect attacked the Lyon City Hall so openly.
The wrath of the Prefecture
Originally, an alarmist press release from the Union of Hotel Trades and Industries (Umih), concerned about the growing concern in Lyon, and part of the concern of its staff and customers, even if the tourist season is in good health. No supporting figures, but a feeling that is beginning to settle in the capital of Gaul, where municipal opposition never fails to blow on the embers.
The Town Hall then praises the recruitment ” unprecedented ” in the municipal police, and welcomes the first positive results of the reinforcements requested from the Minister of the Interior. “I have been asking for them for two years”, repeats Grégory Doucet on a loop. This way of the mayor to arrogate the initiatives of the State justified the wrath of the Prefecture.
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“We cannot accept that the teams of the mayor of Lyon declare that this report is the fruit of their action […]. The State is there and the Town Hall has not responded to our requests who are up to it”, ping the release for Thursday, September 15. Allusion to the municipal refusal to increase the number of video protection cameras, and the possibility of ordering by the national police.
Too much casualness
The Town Hall invokes reports from the Court of Auditors on “unconsidered and not always justified expenses” when it comes to cameras. Grégory Doucet also accuses Minister Gérald Darmanin of deliberately cultivating political cleavage against environmentalists, anxious to maintain his security image in a completely “Sarkozian” style, with a view to the next presidential election.
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By dint of distance and criticism, the relationship between the State and the municipality is weakening under the pressure of security. For several months, the towel has been burning between Pascal Mailhos and Grégory Doucet. The breakout dates back to the night of June 15th.
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After a shooting that left two dead in the Duchère district, the authorities tried to call the mayor of Lyon numerous times to warn him during the night, without success according to several sources. According to the account given by these witnesses, Grégory Doucet did not answer until 7:30 a.m. For the services of the State, it is the casualness of too much. Even if the function of mayor of the third city of France is far from being easy, and if a delay can be excused, the episode leaves traces. Experienced prefect, Pascal Mailhos tries to maintain the dialogue in a complicated environment, between the critical places of the ministry of the interior, and requires to preserve the collective interest of the Lyonnais.
But the controversies are linked crescendo. The brutal release of crime figures in public transport sets fire to the powder, on September 15, on the site of our colleagues D’News Lyon. Taken from a sheet from the statistical service of the Ministry of the Interior, the figures mention 9,655 victims of acts of crime in transport in Lyon for the year 2021, and 11,855 for the whole of the Rhône, an increase of 45%.
In the transports, Lyon second among the most dangerous cities, after Paris
In Villeurbanne, the increase is 53%, with 1,077 victims in 2021. The increase is calculated in relation to the year 2020, a period of confinement, general slowdown, and rather low crime figures. The increase is therefore absolutely not significant, but the figure is impressive, and Lyon is in any case the second most dangerous city, after Paris.
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The media effect is disastrous, and paradoxical, at a time when the situation was actually beginning to improve. The Prefecture affirms that the trend has reversed in 2022, with a 22% drop in crime on public transport, in particular violent acts, and a 31% drop for the month of August alone, this time by compared to 2021.
For the State services, it is the signal of the results encouraged by the security policy. And to recall the reinforcement of 200 police officers in two years, the arrival of 79 new officers by October, and the promise of 300 staff in total by the end of next year, taking into account retirements. With regard to other crime statistics, the Ministry of the Interior, like that of Justice, has been organizing a drastic retention of figures for several years.
This does not help to calm the debate. And leaves room for inaccuracies, controversies, fantasies, everything that transforms the security challenge into dangerous recoveries.
David Gossart and Richard Schittly