Five suspects remain in custody and are facing preliminary terrorism charges for their alleged roles in helping French-Tunisian Bouhlel.
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Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, who mowed down crowds of people enjoying a Bastille Day fireworks display, had long plotted the carnage, prosecutor Francois Molins said.
Authorities identified them as Ramzi A., 21, a native of Nice and a dual French-Tunisian citizen; Chokri C., 37, a Tunisian born in Sousse, Tunisia; and Mohamed Oualid G., 40, a dual French-Tunisian citizen born in La Marsa, Tunisia.
None of the five were known to French intelligence services prior to the attack, Molins said. Only one suspect, Ramzi A., had a criminal record.
Ramzi, Chokri and Oualid were charged with being accomplices to murder by a terror group.
After ploughing down the promenade, Lahouaiej Bouhlel shot multiple times at three police officers, who followed the truck as it continued for another 300 metres.
Bouhlel had exchanged thousands of calls and text messages past year with the accomplices – a Tunisian resident, two Franco-Tunisian men and an Albanian couple.
Paris prosecutor François Molins said authorities found “revealing” online searches and photos on the cellphone and laptop belonging to Nice killer Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel dating back to past year, including photos of the 2015 fireworks display. “I am happy they have brought soldiers of Allah to finish the job”.
Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve acknowledged Thursday that only lightly armed local police were guarding the entrance to a pedestrian zone on the Nice beachfront when Bouhlel sped past a barricade and ran over people.
One of the men is Tunisian, two men are French-Tunisian, one man is Albanian, and the woman is French-Albanian, Molins said.
The revelations come as the French government continues to be plagued by questions over possible security failings, prompting authorities to launch an investigation into potential oversights.
Meanwhile, President Francois Hollande announced on Friday that France would send artillery to Iraq next month for the fight against IS.
The cracks began to show when it was learned Bouhlel was texting with others shortly before the attack and several possible accomplices were arrested several days ago, *Shocked* – Nice truck terrorist maybe wasn’t a “lone wolf” after all.
On Thursday, Parliament also passed a bill extending for another six months the state of emergency that was declared after the November attacks that killed 130 people in and around Paris. No reason for the order was given, but French media has suggested that authorities did not want the images of the truck attack to be used for the propaganda of jihadi groups such as ISIS.
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Five suspects, including a woman, have been charged Thursday in connection to the truck attack during Bastille Day in southern France last week.
