Tax agent killed during tax audit in Pas-de-Calais

The 43 -year -old man, killed with several stab wounds, was kidnapped with a colleague at the home of a second -hand dealer who killed himself.

Mo12345lemonde With AFP

An unthinkable scenario occurred, Tuesday, November 21, during a tax audit in Pas-de-Calais. A tax agent was killed after being kidnapped with a colleague with a second -hand dealer who then killed himself.

The public finance agent “simply did his job (…) today he has not returned. He was killed as part of this tax audit,” said the Minister of Public Accounts, Gabriel Attal, who spoke in the middle of the evening in front of the Senate. The victim, a 43-year-old man, was chief verification brigade in Pas-de-Calais, he said, evoking “an unspeakable drama”.

He was killed “with several stab wounds”, had previously said a source close to the investigation. “A woman, tax inspector”, was also found at the second-hand dealer’s home, “tied up on a chair and deeply shocked”, added this source.

The second -hand dealer “suicide,” said a second source close to the investigation. “When the gendarmes arrived [at the secondary of the second-hand dealer], the two men died,” she said, stressing that the gendarmerie had been warned “by a witness”. The search section of the Hauts-de-France gendarmerie has been seized.

“An average person”

The second-hand dealer, divorced and father of two children, “had arrived in the village four years ago,” Éric Bianchin, the mayor of Bulcourt, a village of 250 told France-Presse (AFP). inhabitants located south of Arras.

“He had bought a farm where he made sales at home. He emptied the houses, garage sales and sold to his home,” he added. “It’s a small village, everyone knows each other. I never had a problem with him, he was helpful, it was an average person. He was integrated into the village,” continued the mayor. According to him, the inhabitants “saw him very little”, because “he left very early in the morning for his activity”

The colleagues of the victim, who worked for “the Departmental Directorate of Public Finance (DDFIP) of Pas-de-Calais and more broadly all public finance agents are upset and mourning this evening,” said Mr. Attal who said he would go to the DDFIP of Arras on Tuesday morning. “Tonight, the public service has the face of this brigade chief,” he insisted, before inviting at a time of meditation “in his tribute”.

Called around 7 pm, the firefighters confirmed at the beginning of the evening “two deceased in Bullecourt and one injured, about to be transported”, adding that the intervention was “still in progress”. Around 11 p.m., the gendarmes were still deployed in the village of Bullecourt, deserted on this evening, blocking the rue du Homé du Broocant, noted an AFP journalist.

/Media reports cited above.