One morning at 7am, Grand Lyon Habitat broke down doors in a squat to register its inhabitants. Unacceptable practices of intimidation. Since a few months, Collomb is no longer mayor of Lyon. He has been thrown out by the green party allied with the “left”, represented by Grégory Doucet at the city hall and Bruno Bernard at the Metropolis. The latter had said that he would soon assert his positions on the subject of housing, when he was questioned on the night of his election by the “Trêve Générale” (general truce) movement.
On Monday, August 17, at 7 a.m., bailiffs came to break down the front door of the squat Le Maria, waking up the inhabitants by forcing their way into each room of the building, breaking the locks of the absent persons and searching through their belongings to find their identities. When we asked them what right they had to do this, the officials answered that they had a warrant, but they never wanted to show it to us, even later when we asked the bailiff for it by e-mail. The bailiffs were not willing to do anything other than put holes in the locks despite our proposals to give them names, either immediately or later by e-mail. Inhabitants and friends therefore had to react by protesting collectively, which eventually pushed them to leave.
Following this event, we contacted the bailiff by e-mail, to have explanations on this scandalous operation. His answer, far from enlightening us, rather surprised us by its intimidating tone, threatening in particular of a “new operation”. In spite of this answer of the bailiff full of false justifications, let us recall that the inhabitants never hid and had even put their identities on the mailboxes, which makes these violent methods even more incomprehensible.
In our mail, we also questioned the methods used during the first visit of the bailiff, where he retrieved the names of two people who did not live in the squat under the pretext of a census and put them on the procedure. Unless their names are changed, they will therefore be obliged to appear before the judge, whereas they had simply gone to see friends.
Who will pay for the broken doors? The precarious inhabitants who already cannot afford to pay rent and who for the most part were homeless before the opening of this squat? Who supports such dirty methods of deceiving residents and extorting names from their friends?
How does a social landlord who claims to offer a roof over everyone’s head tolerate such violent intrusion and registration in a building that “belongs” to him or her?
We call for a position on this subject from the metropolis so that this does not happen again, here or elsewhere.
Inhabitants, friends and supporters of Le Maria squat.
Le Maria Carré
La Guillotière, Lyon, France
lemaria [at] riseup [dot] net
https://squ.at/r/7ub2
Refugees related groups in France https://radar.squat.net/en/groups/country/FR/topic/sans-papiers
Some squats in Lyon: https://radar.squat.net/en/groups/city/lyon/country/FR/squated/squat
Some squats in France: https://radar.squat.net/en/groups/country/FR/squated/squat
Groups (collectives, social centres, squats) in France: https://radar.squat.net/en/groups/country/FR
Events in France: https://radar.squat.net/en/events/country/FR
Rebellyon.info https://rebellyon.info/Squat-portes-cassees-intrusion-et-fichage-22529
