An 18-year-old student who stabbed his schoolteacher in France this week was on Wednesday, May 29, indicted for three attempted murders, prosecutors said, adding the suspect "wanted to find out what it was like to kill someone."
France has in recent years been shaken by a series of school incidents involving attacks on teachers as well as schoolchildren by their peers. In this latest case of teenage violence, an 18-year-old pupil was detained in the western town of Chemille-en-Anjou on Monday after stabbing his English teacher in the face and fleeing.
Prosecutors said on Tuesday that the suspect also targeted two pupils at the school and that he had been preparing "for several days." On Wednesday, public prosecutor Eric Bouillard said that the pupil had been indicted and remanded in custody for three attempted murders of a teacher and two pupils, citing his "intention to kill."
"For him, it was a way of putting an end to the pressure he was feeling, and he also wanted to find out what it was like to kill someone," Bouillard told reporters.
After the attack on the teacher, the teenager tried to stab another pupil. The teenager then attacked a second pupil, targeting him "six or eight times" with a knife, Bouillard said. The pupil had to protect himself with a chair, he added. Then the attacker left through the window, abandoning his knife, according to the authorities. He was arrested by municipal police. Prosecutors have ruled out "any religious or radical motive," saying that the suspect has expressed feelings of "unhappiness."
Education Minister Nicole Belloubet said on Monday she was "deeply shocked and outraged." In April, French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announced measures to crack down on teenage violence in and around schools, as the government seeks to reclaim ground on security from the far-right ahead of upcoming European elections.