A 32-year-old pro-migration activist has been sentenced to 18 months in prison after being found guilty of attacking police at a Paris protest.
The attack took place at a demonstration on the 28th of November, with video played in court showing the accused kicking one officer and later beating other officers at the Place de la Bastille.
Investigators later identified the man, finding him in a disused gendarmerie barracks where he lived with several other people linked to the environmental movement, Le Monde reports.
The 32-year-old had volunteered for a pro-migration association. His lawyer Juan Branco claimed his client was angered over the dismantling of a migrant camp at the Place de la République days before the demonstration.
Lawyer Jérôme Andrei, representing the police officers, said he was disappointed by the verdict and the sentence, saying he expected a harsher punishment. Branco, meanwhile, stated that his client would not be launching an appeal against the judgment.
Paris police arrested 81 people following the November demonstrations held to protest the “global security” law, which would have criminalised filming police.
Across the country, an estimated 500,000 people took to the streets in protest of the law, resulting in clashes between far-left extremists and police in several areas, leading to 61 officers being injured, 23 of them in Paris.
President Emmanuel Macron’s government later backtracked on the controversial law, with Interior Minister Christophe Castaner saying the bill would be completely rewritten.
Far-left attacks on police have become common at major demonstrations and riots. Police in the city of Nantes spoke out late last month about the light punishments many far-left militants receive after attacking officers.
“The fatigue is increasing in the ranks of the Nantes police officers: too much leniency on the part of justice, a lack of support from the hierarchy,” a local police union said.
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