[NYTr] Police shooting sparks French riots

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

sent by Steven L. Robinson

Al Jazeera - Nov 26, 2007
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/8DB6843C-5E61-4330-89CE-A79F4796B787.htm

France riots enter second night

A second night of fighting has ignited in France as a manslaughter
inquiry was ordered into the deaths of two teenagers which first
sparked the riots in a Paris suburb.

About 160 police fired tear gas and rubber bullets during running
battles with rioters late on Monday.

A witness said the police, in riot gear and using paint guns to identify
rioters, were pelted with stones and large fire-crackers on Monday.

After the first night's violence, which lasted about six hours on
Sunday, a judge ordered the inquiry into the teenagers' deaths.

Dozens of youths had clashed with police on Sunday after the two, aged
15 and 16, were killed in a traffic accident with a police car.

A police union said that gangs of youths shot at police, about 30 cars
were torched and shops and buildings were looted.

Twenty-five policemen and one firefighter on Sunday and at least 30
policemen on Monday night were injured.

Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, speaking while on a trip to
Beijing, appealed for calm and "for the judiciary to decide who bears
responsibility".

The Paris suburbs remain an area of tension between the authorities and
immigrant communities after rioting in 2005.

Police stations torched

The authorities boosted security in Villiers-le-Bel, a town north of the
capital, where youths set fire to the town's police station.

Another police station in neighbouring Arnouville-les-Gonesse was
ransacked.

Firemen doused flames that engulfed a garage in Villiers before it could
spread to a neighbouring garage and a nearby petrol station.

The two teenagers were riding a stolen motorcycle when they collided
with a police vehicle in Villiers-le-Bel on Sunday, triggering the
unrest.

The police were accused of fleeing the scene by about 100 youths who
converged on the crash site at a housing estate.

Police said the motorcycle had hit a police car on a routine patrol.

Neither teenager was wearing a helmet, witnesses said.

'Manslaughter'

An internal police investigation has been ordered for "involuntary
manslaughter and failure to assist persons in danger", a state
prosecutor said.

The police investigatory body initially said the police car was unable
to avoid the collision, due to the motorcycle travelling at high speed.

But it also said the police were at "serious fault" in terms of
assisting the motorcycle's riders, a police source said.

Omar Sehhouli, the brother of one of the victims, said the police had
rammed the motorcycle and did not assist the youths.

He said it was "failure to assist a person in danger ... it is 100 per
cent a [police] blunder".