Toulouse killer’s dad suing police for ‘murder'

Father of terrorist who killed 4 Jewish civilians, 3 soldiers files lawsuit against French police for "murder" of his son.

By JOSEPH STRICH
French Toulouse shooter Mohamed Merah 370 (photo credit: REUTERS/France 2 Television)
French Toulouse shooter Mohamed Merah 370
(photo credit: REUTERS/France 2 Television)
The father of the Islamist terrorist who killed three soldiers and four Jewish civilians in Toulouse in March, before being shot dead, on Tuesday filed a lawsuit against the police for what he said was the “murder” of his son.
Mohamed Benalel Merah, who lives in Algeria, filed his suit against RAID, the special operations tactical unit of the French National Police that conducted the siege of the son, Mohamed Merah.
According to Algerian attorney, Zahia Mokhtari, the head of the family’s legal team, there is evidence that Merah was “liquidated” by the police and not just killed in an exchange of fire.
Mokhtari, speaking to the press in Algeria, did not show reporters the “evidence,” nor provide any details, just explaining that it included videos filmed by Merah during the siege. In the videos, French TV reported, Merah was shouting at one of the commandos in front of him: “You, who sent me to Afghanistan and Pakistan, you are in fact a policeman, treason!” A French member of the legal team, Isabelle Coutant- Peyre, told journalists that the suit was being brought for “murder with aggravating circumstances.”
These circumstances were, according to her, “heavily armed people and a guy shot up alone in his apartment.
This alone is enough to raise questions.” In 2001, Coutant-Peyre married one of her clients, Ilich Ramirez Sanchez (“Carlos the Jackal”), in a Muslim ceremony.
Mohamed Merah was known to French authorities since he traveled to Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Arrested numerous times in France and even briefly put in jail, last March he carried out a series of attacks in his home city of Toulouse: He killed three soldiers before, outside the Ozar Hatorah school, shooting a rabbi and his two children, and finally the daughter of the headmaster.
He filmed himself carrying out the attacks.
A few days later, he was identified and found in his apartment. After a 32-hour siege, he was shot dead while jumping from his window.
Soon thereafter, 19 people were arrested in France in connection with the Forsane Alizza Islamist group, to which Merah belonged.