What is the Brav-M, this brigade which focuses criticism on police violence? – France

The acronym is coming back more and more, associated with criticism and a sulphurous image: the Brav-M, for Motorized Violent Action Repression Brigades. Images filmed in Paris on Monday, during spontaneous rallies after the rejection of the motion of censure, once again called into question the practices associated with it and triggered a report to the IGPN, the police force. Deputies of La France insoumise have since asked for their “dismantling”, petition in support. Friday evening, a new seizure of the IGPN was announced by the prefect of police of Paris after the broadcast, in the media, of recordings of violent and threatening remarks made by agents of a unit of these brigades, Monday .

Set up during the yellow vests

The Brav-M were set up in Paris, in March 2019, by the prefect of police at the time, Didier Lallement. These brigades had taken over from the former Rapid Action Detachments (DAR), initiated a few months earlier in the context of the yellow vests. During this period, major demonstrations enamelled with violence had followed one another in Paris.

Rapid Movement Brigades

The principle of the Brav-M: a biker policeman associated with a gendarme or a policeman, often a member of the Security and Intervention Companies (CSI), accustomed to maintaining order, or of the Anti-Crime Brigade (Bac)?. The objective is to “combine mobility and the ability to arrest”, according to the Ministry of the Interior, in 2020. These pairs must make it possible to move quickly to different points, particularly in the case of violence and excesses during demonstrations. , then to intervene after getting off the motorcycle.

The composition of the Brav-M is defined at each event. Mostly deployed in Paris, these pairs also exist elsewhere in France as mixed protection and arrest devices (DMPI), recalls Le Monde.

Method and training questioned

The Brav-M have already been questioned during violent demonstrations. In May 2019, images showed police arriving on motorcycles pursuing and hitting a student living in the residence located within the grounds of the Pitié-Salpêtrière hospital. In general, the Brav-M have the reputation of “going into contact”, not without violence. “They are backing down, they know that we are going into contact”, confided an agent to BFMTV during the Parisian demonstration on December 5, 2019, already against a pension reform project.

This Friday, threatening and violent remarks made by agents of one of these units, last Monday, March 20, and captured in a recording authenticated and transcribed by Le Monde, further fuel this image. “I can tell you that we broke elbows and mouths,” said one of the police officers, according to the daily, which also mentions the sound of slapping. Another recording released by Loopsider makes similar statements. The prefect of police of Paris, Laurent Nuñez, announced enter the IGPN.

The insufficient training of the agents brought to be assigned there and not specialized in the maintenance of order, particularly those of the Bac, is sometimes criticized. In 2019, the Senate Law Commission recommended that these agents, “in particular [ceux] from the anti-crime brigades, undergo specific training in maintaining order”.

The shadow of Malik Oussekine’s “voltigeurs”

The poor image of the Brav-M goes beyond their recent history. These motorcycle policemen are often compared to the “voltigeurs”, a platoon of motorcycle policemen created after May-68 to intervene in demonstrations, renowned for their truncheons while driving. A platoon mainly associated with the Malik Oussekine affair: two of them had pursued the young 22-year-old demonstrator in Paris during the mobilization against the Devaquet reform in 1986. Beaten up, Malik Oussekine had succumbed to a cardiac arrest. This event preceded the abandonment of the Devaquet reform. The platoon of voltigeurs had subsequently been disbanded.