15 people were taken hostage on a train near Essert-sous-Champvent VD on the 8th of February. The 32-year-old perpetrator was armed with an axe and a knife. The passengers and the train driver were unharmed. The hostage-taker was shot and killed during the police operation.
The Iranian family of the hostage-taker filed a complaint this week to find out under what circumstances their relative was shot dead by a Vaudois police officer. According to the RTS investigation department, the family believes that the fatal outcome at the end of the four-hour hostage-taking “could have been avoided”.
RTS journalists were able to contact the younger brother of the 32-year-old Iranian-Kurdish asylum seeker. The man, who lives in Iran, asks himself: “Why didn’t they use other tools to neutralise him?” It was clear that his brother had behaved very badly, the man admits. The family did not support the act, but his brother did not deserve to be killed. “He just wanted people to listen to him. He wanted to scream, it was a cry for help.”
In their complaint, the family is targeting “anyone who unlawfully contributed to the death of our son”. The Vaud public prosecutor’s office, which has already launched an investigation into the circumstances of this death, confirmed to RTS that it had received the complaint at the end of the week and had granted the parents the status of private plaintiffs.
Via their lawyer in Switzerland, they are also calling for the investigation to be extended to the care of their son, who arrived in Switzerland in 2022 and had severe mental health problems that have since worsened.
Familie des getöteten Iraners (32) reicht Anzeige ein – 20 Minuten
