Six years later, three police officers tried for the attack on music producer Michel Zecler

Six years after the filmed attack on black producer Michel Zecler, which caused shock waves in France, three police officers are on trial from Monday before the Paris criminal court. Prosecuted for willful violence in meetings and forgery of public documents by a person holding public authority, the three accused, whose trial will last two weeks, face 15 years of criminal imprisonment. A fourth police officer will be tried in criminal court.

The affair, which aroused the “shame” of Emmanuel Macron, had relaunched the debate on violence and racism in the police in France, deemed systemic by victims and researchers, but relating to isolated acts according to the institution and the police unions. On November 21, 2020, while France, in the midst of the Covid health crisis, was experiencing its second confinement, Michel Zecler was arrested by a police patrol in front of his Parisian music studio for not wearing a mask and suspicion of cannabis consumption.

“An avalanche of blows”, as the investigators wrote. Between 7:42 p.m. and 7:47 p.m., the producer was hit around thirty times in the face and all over his body, with punches and batons. The medical expertise will note craniofacial trauma, a wound to the lip and scalp, a complete rupture of the biceps tendon, justifying an ITT (total work interruption) of 45 days.

Revealed by the Loopsider site six days after the events, the video surveillance images undermine the police officers' version. Their arrest report indicated that the producer had hit them and tried to grab their baton. After his arrest, Michel Zecler was placed in police custody for “violence” and “rebellion”, before the investigation was closed after the exploitation of video surveillance.

Confronted with these images, the police officers, Aurélien L., Pierre P. and Philippe T., now aged 29, 37 and 50, admitted during the investigation that the producer had not carried out any blows, but assured that they were afraid for their lives. Suspended from the police, two of them were also imprisoned for a month. The accused, however, all contested the racist dimension of the attack, which was not upheld by the courts due to lack of evidence. Michel Zecler claims to have been treated as a “dirty nigger”, which the police deny. Their lawyers, contacted by AFP, did not wish to speak.

Michel Zecler, now 47 years old, still has physical after-effects - he has a titanium anchor in his left arm following the rupture of his tendon. Above all, he remains very morally marked. “Six years is a very, very long time,” and as the trial approaches “lots of things come back, like nightmares,” he told AFP. Michel Zecler, who regularly attends trials where police officers are implicated, “no longer believes at all” in the concept of “bad apples” in the police, and still wonders today about “the ease” with which he was attacked.

“It’s an attack that shouldn’t have happened,” sighs the producer, who hopes at the very least that his trial will ensure that “this type of thing happens less often.” “But there is not always video,” he notes bitterly. The Zecler affair had led to “the Beauvau of security”, organized by the government with the police unions, a seven-month consultation on themes such as training, supervision, video recording.

“A mountain that gave birth to a mouse,” according to Mr. Zecler, who always has “the impression of being faced with an institution that refuses to believe that some of its members can make mistakes.” The police “wear a uniform, represent the law, and must be irreproachable,” believes the producer. “I have a lot of respect for the police profession. When it's done well."