The Paris prosecutor said Thursday that the man who drove a truck through crowds celebrating Bastille Day in Nice, killing 84 people, had accomplices and seemed to have been plotting his attack for months.
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Mr Molins said that the inquiry had “progressed and not only confirmed the murderous premeditated nature of Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel’s act but also established that he benefited from support and complicity”.
Police have uncovered thousands of calls and messages between Lahouaiej Bouhlel, and five accomplices, after going through his social media accounts, laptop and phone records.
Tunisian terrorist Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel (right) poses for selfie before the attack.
The newspaper Libération reported Thursday that only one municipal police vehicle was positioned at the spot where Lahouaiej Bouhlel barreled through and on to the promenade, and it said that although state and city officials had agreed on – and stuck to – a security plan for Bastille Day, the government misrepresented those measures after the attack.
Mollins added that Bouhlel planned the attack for many months and received logistical support for the assault from the five suspects.
“These investigating magistrates will continue interrogating the various people involved in the commission of these terrorist acts of the 14th of July that led to the death of 84 people”, Molins said.
It also emerged that one of the five suspects in custody, a Tunisian named Mohamed Oualid G., had filmed the scene of the crime the day after the carnage, as it crawled with paramedics and journalists.
A 31-year-old Tunisian who had been living in France since 2005, he carried out the attack during Bastille Day celebrations on July 14, ramming a truck into a crowd that had been enjoying a fireworks display.
In April this year, Chokri C sent Mr Bouhlel a Facebook message reading: “Load the truck with 2,000 tonnes of iron. release the brakes my friend and I will watch”.
People close to Bouhlel said he had shown no signs of radicalization until very recently.
Like Mr. Lahouaiej Bouhlel, none of the accomplices were known to French intelligence services, Mr. Molins said.
He identified the suspects as four men – two Franco-Tunisians, a Tunisian and an Albanian – and one woman of dual French-Albanian nationality.
Just minutes before the attack, Bouhlel exchanged messages with one of the men, thanking him for the gun. “They brought the soldiers of Allah to finish the work”.
Cazeneuve then launched an internal police investigation into the handling of the Nice attack.
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A day after that text was sent, on January 11, millions of French people rallied in Paris and other French cities under the slogan “Je Suis Charlie” (I am Charlie) in solidarity with the victims at the satirical newspaper. He also fired an automatic pistol at police before they shot and killed him.
