sentences confirmed on appeal for the attack on an “antifa” bar in Paris

The Paris Court of Appeal confirmed on Thursday the convictions of two ultra-right activists to respectively one year and six months in prison for the attack in June 2020 on a Parisian bar emblematic of the anti-fascist movement.

These two activists, including Marc de Cacqueray-Valmenier, the presumed leader of the Zouaves Paris, an ultra-right group now dissolved, were neither present nor represented in the deliberations.

Attack with baseball bats

Marc de Cacqueray-Valmenier, already convicted and implicated in recent years in several cases of violence, was retried for the attack with baseball bats and tear gas, on June 4, 2020, from the Saint-Sauveur bar, in the Ménilmontant district in Paris.

The court confirmed the sentence of one year’s imprisonment, under an electronic bracelet, pronounced against him by the criminal court on January 21, 2022 for degradation and violence. The defendant, who was also being prosecuted for refusing to communicate the unlock code for his phone while in police custody, was released for this offense alone.

Read alsoUltra-right: the alleged leader of the Zouaves Paris sentenced to one year in prison

The punitive expedition, claimed by the “Zouaves Paris“, followers of the violent raids way “hooligans“, had occurred almost seven years to the day after the death of anti-fascist activist Clément Méric. The accusation relied in particular on a message sent by Marc de Cacqueray-Valmenier three days after the events, where he congratulated “his troops from the action carried out“. His DNA had also been detected on an ice-breaking hammer found near the bar.

The Court of Appeal also confirmed the sentence of its co-defendant, Bastien D., to six months in prison for this violence, and the revocation of his suspension of a previous sentence, to one month in prison, for wearing a prohibited weapon.