A Spatial Report of the February 11 Banlieue Protest Against Police Violence in Bobigny
▻https://thefunambulist.net/architectural-projects/spatial-report-saturdays-banlieue-gathering-police-violence-bobigny
On February 2, 2017, in the banlieue municipality of Aulnay-sous-Bois (North-East), 22-year-old Black man Théo L. was raped by a police officer, while three others were holding him. As of today, Théo is still at the hospital suffering of a 3.5-inch-long tear of his anus. The video showing the crime was quickly spread, provoking outrage country-wide, and making it impossible for police officers to deny the anal penetration with a telescopic baton to which Théo was subjected. However, the officers and the service within the police in charge of the investigation have since made the outrageous claim that what happened was an accident, going as far as forming the phrase “deliberate rape” to describe what the situation was not according to them, in an extremely dangerous redefinition of what a rape actually is: an unambiguous crime with no room whatsoever for interpretation regarding what could be claimed as “attenuating circumstances.” The same night, the cité des 3000 — a cité consists of high-density social housing in low density urbanism — where Théo lives was plunged into darkness while the police undertook numerous identity checks within it. Other banlieues saw young people revolting against armed police officers in full gear operating in neighborhoods that they appear to consider as enemy territory.
