Two Morrocan migrants were arrested in the city centre of Saint-Nazaire after hurling racial abuse at two French police officers and threatening to slit the throats of the officials.
The two men were arrested on Friday after they confronted two highway patrol officers in the centre of Saint-Nazaire during a routine traffic stop alongside a third man. According to the police, the two men became aggressive and began hurling insults at them.
One of the Moroccans, who is said to be 34 years old, reportedly began disparaging one of the officials over his skin colour saying, “dirty negro, you are really a dirty negro,” and hit one of the officers on the elbow, Actu reports.
Another of the individuals, a 17-year-old, allegedly directly threatened the officers saying, “when you are alone, when there is no police there, we will catch you, we will cut your throat.” The teen has since been taken into the care of a reception centre for minors based in the nearby city of Nantes.
The case is not the first time in recent years the French police have been racially abused prior to an arrest.
In 2019, a 37-year-old man in the city of Limoges was confronted by police after boarding a local bus while heavily intoxicated and assaulted officers who tried to remove him from the bus, spitting on them. After being detained, the man called the officers “dirty whites” and threatened to kill them.
The man, who claimed to have been assaulted by bouncers at a bar prior to the altercation with police, later claimed he thought the police were the bouncers had had allegedly assaulted him.
A year later during the early months of the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic, another similar incident took place in Paris and saw a woman angered over restrictions at the time, which required residents to present papers to freely move in the city.
When confronted by police, the woman claimed to have the virus, calling them “dirty whites” and said, “I hope you will all die of Covid.”