Complaints were filed after intruders, probably high school students, registered with pseudonyms linked to terrorism or the apology of terrorism.
In press articles and on social networks, a new term has appeared: “virtual blockade”, to disrupt distance learning courses. In fact, 28 high schools out of 52 were closed in the Alpes-Maritimes in the face of physical blockages and high school mobilizations. Instead, classes are given by videoconference but many disruptions have already been noted by teachers. Beyond the schoolboy jokes, several serious incidents took place according to the rectorate.
Five establishments concerned
Contacted by ICI Côte d'Azur, the rectorate of the Nice academy specifies: "we have cases that have been reported to us where there have been either attacks on the values of the Republic, or insults during the videos. And this concerns 5 high schools out of the 28 remotely from the Academy."
This is the case of the Vauban regional vocational high school in Nice. Classes were allegedly disrupted there by people with a connection link who used pseudonyms like “Abdeslam”, “Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel” or “Freeze Corleone”. The first two are terrorists, including Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, the author of the attack of July 14, 2016 in Nice which left 86 dead and 400 injured. The last, Freeze Corleone, is a rapper who was sentenced last April to fifteen months in prison for advocating terrorism in one of his songs which suggests a reference to the attack of July 14, 2016.
The mayor of Nice, Eric Ciotti, returned to these facts in a message on Facebook on Tuesday. He declares: “School cannot become the scene of this drift. The response must be immediate, firm and exemplary.”
Reports and complaints
Faced with these disruptions to videoconference classes, "a complaint was filed by establishment", for the five high schools concerned, specifies the rectorate of the Nice academy. There was also each time “a report via article 40”.
This is the code of criminal procedure which stipulates that: "Any constituted authority, any public officer or civil servant who, in the exercise of his functions, acquires knowledge of a crime or an offense is required to give notice without delay to the public prosecutor and to transmit to this magistrate all information, minutes and acts relating thereto."
The Nice public prosecutor's office also clarified through a press release that it had received: "today three reports for facts that occurred during distance learning courses in three high schools in Nice." And to add: "These facts, distinct from each other, are particularly likely to characterize the offenses of glorifying terrorism, racist insults, provocation of hatred or discrimination, sexist insults, disclosure of personal information of a person entrusted with a public service mission with a risk of harm to persons and threats aimed at a person entrusted with a public service mission."
The public prosecutor of Nice, Damien Martinelli also mentioned that the “very first elements do not allow at this stage to link these facts to high school students in the classes concerned by these lessons”. Separate investigations, entrusted to the SLPJ in Nice, will be opened to try to identify those involved.
The digital waiting room as a solution
Faced with these disruptions, the Ministry of National Education recalled that for the next video sessions, it was possible to make students wait in a digital waiting room before letting them access the course in order to ensure their identity. It is also possible with this State tool, used for distance learning courses, to exclude students from videoconferencing.
