It seems everything started with a simple request for a lighter. A man was shot by police in the night between Friday, February 16th and Saturday, February 17th in the 19th district of Paris while threatening officers with a cleaver, reports Le Parisien.
Haitman, a 40-year-old man, had an altercation around 3:05 am with another individual on Boulevard d’Indochine, in front of a tram station. After spitting in the face of his interlocutor, he pulled out a butcher’s knife from his jacket with the clear intention to use it, according to information from our colleagues. The victim, backing away, asked for help from a RATP agent passing by. They alerted the police.
Alerted, plainclothes police officers initially ordered the individual to drop his weapon. Without success. The officers then requested backup from colleagues equipped with a Taser. Four of them arrived and two used their weapons. “The prongs were planted but had no effect. The man continued to run towards them with his cleaver in hand,” specified a source close to the matter.
Four officers then fired, shooting a total of 22 cartridges. Seven bullets hit their target, the man was shot by the police and officially declared dead at 3:52 am. The Paris prosecutor’s office has opened two investigations: one into the armed violence against law enforcement, the other into the death of the individual, conducted by the Inspectorate General of the National Police (IGPN).
