“We cannot ignore what is happening. We live in a society that is increasingly violent. “We are seeing more and more unrestrained violence among teenagers and sometimes even younger teenagers,” Macron said during a visit to a school in the ninth arrondissement of Paris.
Viry-Châtillon is a town with 30,000 inhabitants south of Paris. Classmates of the victim told AFP he was “a smooth, smiling boy who got on well with everyone”. They fear that the attackers will not return to the school and attack other children.
“Three or four persons attacked him on the staircase, covered him with wounds, massacred him. I was particularly shocked by the violence of the act. Those attackers are animals,” said Viry-Châtillon mayor Jean-Marie Vilain on BFM TV. According to the mayor, the victim’s mother was also in a very bad mental state, even before she lost her son.
The boy was already being revived by paramedics on Thursday, he underwent surgery at night and died shortly after noon today. No one has yet been arrested in connection with the crime. The motive is not clear either, according to criminologists, there is no indication that it was a clash between two hostile gangs. After the victim died, the detectives reassessed the act from attempted murder to murder, they also suspect “group violence”. According to the mayor, an analysis of city police camera footage could provide more clues.
An autopsy is planned for the next few hours. “Investigations are continuing to establish the circumstances of these crimes and enable the apprehension of the perpetrators,” said the public prosecutor according to RTL.fr.
Thursday’s incident is another in a series of youth violence across France. This week, a 13-year-old girl who was attacked outside a school in Montpellier, in the south of the country, ended up in a coma. The seriously injured girl is recovering and has already woken up from the coma. Three detainees confessed to the crime today, one fifteen-year-old remains in custody and is being investigated on suspicion of attempted murder.
Macron said today that the state must not tolerate such aggressive acts, but also punish them. Part of the responsibility, according to the president, must be taken by the families of problem children, but also by the state administration or the courts. The solution proposed by the government is greater support for families dealing with aggressive children, more consistent prevention and the establishment of new facilities for young people, which would help aggressive children, Macron said.
