France: Police officers to be charged over electrocution that sparked riots

A judge in the Paris suburb of Bobigny is charging two police officers in connection with the 2005 electrocution deaths of two teens that sparked three weeks of rioting throughout France, judicial officials said today.

The two officers are to be charged with “non-assistance to people in danger,” the officials said.

The judge was to formally charge the police officers in his final report to the parties in the case later today, they said.

Zyed Benna, 17, and Bouna Traore, 15, were killed on October 27, 2005 after they hid from police in a power substation in the Paris suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois.

An internal police review of the electrocutions, released in December, faulted police officers for their handling of the case.

The report confirmed the officers had indeed been chasing the teens before they were killed – which the Interior Ministry and police had initially denied.

The report said officers should immediately have notified French energy company EDF that the youths were hiding in the power station.