Franck Elong Abé, the alleged attacker of Yvan Colonna, who has been described as rather “silent” since the beginning of his police custody, is said to have finally started to talk: to investigators on Thursday afternoon, he explained his crime with a “blasphemy” of the Corsican activist who had “spoken badly about the Prophet”. The day before, the 36-year-old Cameroonian, convicted of “criminal association in preparation of an act of terrorism” and imprisoned in Arles prison, had brutally attacked his fellow inmate Yvan Colonna when they were alone in a gym.(…)Libération
The Corsican independence movement activist was still in a coma in Marseille on Thursday morning and was in a stable condition, according to his lawyer Patrice Spinosi, who is also the Colonna family’s lawyer.
The day after the violent attack in Arles prison that put Yvan Colonna in a coma, the anti-terrorism prosecutor’s office announced it would take over the investigation. The activist, sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of prefect Claude Erignac, was the victim on Wednesday of “strangulation with bare hands followed by suffocation” while he was doing strength training on his own, according to Tarascon prosecutor Laurent Gumbau.BFMTV
According to our information, the suspect for the attack on the murderer of Prefect Erignac on March 2 had provoked several serious incidents in other prisons. An investigation was opened for “attempted murder”.
The family of Yvan Colonna expressed “their anger and incomprehension” in a statement circulated by their lawyer Patrice Spinosi on Wednesday evening. “She wants to hold the state accountable for the murderous attack to which he fell victim. How could such a “particularly conspicuous” inmate be so brutally attacked by a fellow inmate? Where were the guards whose job it was to prevent such attacks?” the statement continues.
The news caused horror at the head of the prison administration and led to an emergency meeting attended, among others, by Naoufel Gaied, head of the mission to combat violent radicalisation in the prison administration. Aside from the personality of the victim, an independence activist convicted of murder and considered a model prisoner since his incarceration in July 2003, the personality of the attacker raises at least as many questions as the circumstances of the attack and his prison record, which has been rather chaotic to say the least.Le Monde