Mohamed Amra's Escape: The Stakes of a High-Risk First Hearing

A tense extraction is coming in Orne next week. Mohamed Amra will be taken from Condé-sur-Sarthe prison to be questioned for the first time by the investigating judge in charge of the investigation into his escape during the attack on the Incarville toll booth on May 14, 2024, which cost the lives of two prison officers. The decision to conduct his interrogation in a Paris court rather than via videoconference has been criticized by prison unions, as has the Minister of the Interior, given the sensitivity of the drug trafficker's safety. On the merits of the case, too, the stakes of this first interrogation are high: will Mohamed Amra agree to break the code of silence?

When he was placed in solitary confinement in this high-security prison last February, after nine months on the run and his arrest in Romania, the guards had warned that they would be careful to ensure that the administration took into account the high level of danger posed by the inmate. "Dedicating a GIGN unit to each of his releases would be a real plundering of state resources," Ahmed Saih, deputy secretary of FO justice, told Le Figaro , arguing for all of these actions to be carried out by videoconference. This option was ultimately not retained , to the surprise of the Minister of the Interior , who expressed his astonishment on RTL this Wednesday: " Bringing such dangerous people out of prison involves major risks. We must adapt to this and agree to either the judge coming to the prison or a videoconference. "

The response from Mohamed Amra's lawyer, Lucas Montagnier, was swift: " The defense wishes to point out that this measure was decided in strict compliance with current legislation. The professional magistrates in charge of the judicial investigation considered it necessary for Mr. Amra's interrogation to be held in person - a decision that his lawyers can only approve. The opposing positions expressed by the Ministers of Justice and the Interior do not call for any comment from us, since only the magistrates are competent to determine the terms of such a procedural act. "

From an operational point of view, the extraction will be carried out, as during his transfer to prison, by the GIGN. This elite unit of the gendarmerie is accustomed to convoys of highly sensitive detainees. It was notably this unit that transported Salah Abdeslam during the nine months of the trial of the November 13 attacks . A source close to the case tells Le Figaro that the unit has already carried out a reconnaissance and planning phase on the approximately 200-kilometer journey. According to our information, the convoy will operate route variations, but also slow motion and fast motion techniques in order to be as unpredictable as possible. The escort will be accompanied by surveillance posts all along the route. Air assets…