the Lyon public prosecutor’s office opens an investigation for “public provocation to hatred”
In response to the demonstration organized by ultra-right groups in Lyon on Friday October 21, the Lyon prosecutor’s office announced on Tuesday October 25 that it had opened an investigation for “public provocation to hatred”.
Four days after the racist and xenophobic outbursts that punctuated the demonstration organized by groups of the Lyon ultra-right in the city center, the Lyon public prosecutor’s office announced the opening of an investigation for “public provocation to hatred and/or violence against a person or a group of people because of their origin or their belonging to an ethnic group, nation, race or religion.” The investigation was entrusted to the Rhône departmental directorate of public security.
The opening of this investigation is carried out “in the extension” of the report made Monday by the prefect of the Rhône to the public prosecutor of Lyon “concerning the demonstration of the ultra-right on Friday” last, specifies the prosecution.
The organizers of the procession had claimed to organize a march in “tribute” to Lola, the schoolgirl killed in terrible circumstances in Paris. The demonstration, held Friday evening in the center of Lyon, had gathered 100 to 150 people, according to the prefecture. Videos on social networks, in particular on the Twitter account of the small group “Remparts”, had shown hooded people shouting “immigrant murderers”, with a banner “Justice for Lola, immigration kills”.
Members of the ultra-right refer with these slogans to the circumstances of Lola’s death. In this case, the suspect, of Algerian nationality, was under an obligation to leave French territory (OQTF) at the time of the death of Lola, killed on October 14.
Monday, October 24, the mayor of Lyon, Grégory Doucet, had already reacted by asking for the dissolution of “Remparts Lyon”, a far-right structure heir to the dissolved association “Génération identitaire”. The ecological mayor of Lyon sent a letter to the President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron to ask for the dissolution of the “Remparts”.