Paris prosecutor: Internet radicalized Notre Dame attacker
Algerian man who lunged at officers with a hammer 'for Syria' had IS manual for 'lone wolves,' jihadist propaganda at his home
PARIS — The hammer-wielding man who attacked police officers patrolling in front of Notre Dame Cathedral appears to have radicalized himself through the internet and was unknown to French police and intelligence services, the chief prosecutor in Paris said Saturday.
Francois Molins said the 40-year-old Algerian doctoral student is being charged with attempted murder in connection with a terrorist enterprise and crime of terrorist conspiracy.
One police officer was slightly injured in Tuesday’s attack.
The assailant — crying out “This is for Syria!”— was shot by police. He received hospital treatment for a shotgun injury to the torso.
Molins told a news conference Saturday that the man had the “profile of a neophyte” that counterterrorism services fear as much as extremists who are trained to carry out attacks.
“The terrorist threat today is shape-shifting. And this time we have been confronted by an internal threat … individuals who want to carry out projects here when they have difficulties joining the war zones,” Molins said.
Molins, who hasn’t identified the suspect by his full name, confirmed that he was an ex-journalist who was legally living in France as a student working on his doctoral thesis.
Investigators who searched a student residence where he lived in the Paris suburb of Cergy-Pontoise found a declaration of allegiance to the Islamic State group he filmed on the morning of the attack. He presented himself as a “soldier of the caliphate,” prosecutors said.
They have also found a laptop and four USB sticks that included Islamic extremist propaganda, photos and videos referring to attacks in London, Paris, Brussels and at a church in the French region of Normandy, and images of the war in Syria.
He also had a “lone wolves’ manual” compiled by IS, the prosecutor said.
The man described himself as a Sunni Muslim who started a “quite radical” religious observance about 10 months ago, Molins said.
The suspect bought the hammer and two kitchen knives, which were found on him after the attack, in a supermarket on March 27.
Molins said his family and friends didn’t notice signs of radicalization. He described the man as socially and psychologically “isolated.”
Investigators haven’t established the existence of any contact between the man and people living in Syria and Iraq.