“I told myself that a guy who intervenes is a bit symbolic”: the street medic hit by CRS testifies

For several days, hundreds of Internet users and elected officials have been wondering what happened to a street medic (volunteer demonstrator who received first aid training), Saturday October 17, Place de la République. Franceinfo found him, he is not dead, but he is injured and shocked. The man who died near Place de la République was in fact 59 years old.

On Saturday, around 4 p.m., the CRS have already been confronting demonstrators on the Place de la République in Paris for several hours. Antoine, trained in first aid, sees a water cannon truck approaching and tries to prevent it from passing. “I told myself that a guy interposing is a bit symbolic,” he says. “I stood in the middle and simply held out my arms so that they could see that I was not threatening.”

Several blows “almost everywhere”, including to the head

Several videos of the scene, which we have authenticated, show him in fact with his arms outstretched. He is not threatening, but the police arrive and beat him with shields and batons. Antoine says several times that he is a street medic, but nothing helps. He is alone, surrounded by several dozen police officers. "It was written on my t-shirt and I had an armband that I had made with a red cross. I took several blows to the head, blows all over the place, something exploded in my back, I don't know what it was but it burned me. There, it was a bit of a blackout. I remember managing to extricate myself, but afterwards, it was a black hole until I woke up in a fire truck."

Antoine ended up losing consciousness. "When I felt that I was losing consciousness, I didn't try to fight. I let myself go, I didn't know what was going to happen behind, so I didn't prefer to be conscious." While he is unconscious, the CRS drag him to the ground, first by his backpack, then they leave him lying on the ground for a few moments, in the debris of the clashes. Then, they carry him by the legs and arms, take him further, and finally put him in a side safety position. Many Internet users then think that he is dead.

Taken care of by firefighters

Other street medics and journalists come to help him. A person present testifies: "When we took him in charge, he reiterated that he was, basically, present at the demonstration to provide treatment, but we felt that he also wanted to attack the police." Another person told us that they carried the injured man to a nearby street so that he could be taken care of by the firefighters. A video shows this moment, where Antoine slowly regains consciousness with the firefighters. One of them describes the scene: "The young man regained consciousness, he did not present any injury or apparent fracture, we decided to keep him away from the clashes at Place de la République so that he could be safe."

He returns home, but he feels bad all weekend. “I was in bed all Sunday with quite severe headaches, and on Monday, as it wasn't getting any better, I called the SAMU to go to the hospital.” Antoine has a head trauma. He did not file a complaint. He does not believe in the effectiveness of the IGPN, the police force.

He published a video on Instagram on Tuesday, October 20, to call for peaceful demonstrations without falling into violence, because he believes that this is what the police want.