On Tuesday 29 September 2026, during the blockade of the Leclerc-Navarre lycée in Alençon, a scene filmed by the local newspaper L’Orne Hebdo goes viral: a student is restrained by the neck by a police officer according to ICI Orne; France 3 Normandie, in its lead paragraph, speaks of a gendarme, but the body of its article and ICI speak of a police officer.
The student’s version, gathered by franceinfo: she had not come to protest but to watch; law enforcement had intervened to allow firefighters to put out a fire. Pushed violently, she says she fell with her hands on a police officer’s chest, who then seized her by the neck, pinned her against a fence and then to the ground several times (which only she reports: the video shows the neck hold). She says she had trouble breathing and, while having “not really any injuries” (translated), neck pain, aches and a sore jaw. No medical report or ITT (days of total incapacity for work) is reported: the severity retained (“Minor injury”) follows what she herself describes. She was handcuffed and placed in police custody.
The same day, ICI reported other events outside the same lycée (firework mortars fired, a gendarme and a police officer slightly injured): see the dedicated entry. That article does not say that these events precede or follow the neck scene, and the prefecture of the Orne does not detail their nature in ICI’s quotation of 30 September.
The authorities’ version: according to the prefecture of the Orne, cited by ICI, the intervention was “proportionate” (translated) and complied with the regulatory framework, the police officers having been the target of an “assault of rare violence” (translated). The departmental delegate of a police union points out that the arm-lock hold is a lawful technique. The Orne federation of parents’ associations denounces a disproportionate response.
Amnesty International France (02/10) describes a video filmed by a journalist of L’Orne Hebdo, in which the student cries out twice “You are hurting me!” (translated), and recalls that under international law choke-hold techniques in law enforcement are prohibited (the organisation’s position, not a judicial characterisation of this scene). In her testimony of 2 October, the student states that the case concerning her “was closed without action” (translated); this point, which concerns the proceedings against her and not the police officer’s intervention, is not confirmed by any public prosecutor’s office in the sources read.
Follow-up
No complaint or investigation into the police officer’s intervention is mentioned in the articles read (ICI 30/09, France 3 Normandie 02/10, Amnesty France 02/10), re-read on 2026-10-04.