Incidents of violence: the trauma that follows
A mother and her six-year-old daughter were caught up in an extremely violent incident in the middle of the street in Concordia. Threatened at gunpoint, the mother watched as her car was driven off with her child still inside. Although the little girl was quickly released and the car recovered, the trauma remains very much present. Today, this mother wants to speak out to remind people that “this can happen to anyone”.
It all begins just like almost every evening. At 4 pm, her six-year-old daughter leaves school, which is on the same street, and joins her at the Concordia cardiology clinic where she works. An hour later, mother and daughter head home together.
On Thursday 10 September, it is around 5.20 pm when she settles her daughter into the car before getting in herself. It was at that moment that a man appeared, his face concealed by a bandana. He pointed a gun at her and demanded her keys, her phone and the car. She refused to get out. Not whilst her daughter was still inside. The man then pointed his gun at her stomach. In a reflex action, she pushed his arm away as she got out of the car. A shot was fired. The bullet struck the ground.
Carjacking and child abduction
What happened next unfolded in a matter of seconds. The mother struggled with her attacker, trying to make him drop his gun and screaming for help. On the street, no one reacts. Only a homeless man emerges from one of the abandoned houses, naked. He quickly goes back to get dressed, then returns to help her. The young woman continues to defend herself. She pushes her attacker, who falls to the ground without letting go of his gun. Caught up in his fall, she falls with him. The man finally manages to get to his feet, gets into the car and drives off. His daughter is still inside. She runs after the vehicle, screaming, trying to keep up with it, but when she reaches the SAUR building, in a state of shock, she loses consciousness. When she comes round, municipal police officers are on the scene and someone has alerted the gendarmerie. Then her daughter appears. She runs towards her mother. The attacker has finally let her out of the car a few metres further on. It is an immense relief, though it does not erase what has just happened.
After the attack, the fear
They cannot get back home because the keys are in the car, as is the mobile phone… which will enable the car to be tracked to Agrément. The gendarmes were able to locate it. She has got her car back but lives in fear because the thug still has the key. As for the little girl, she didn’t return to school until a week later. Her family are rallying round her, supporting her and trying to take her mind off things. Her mother is also trying to move on, but acknowledges that the trauma is still there.
If she has chosen today to speak out about this attack, through us, it is to alert the public, to remind people that this kind of violence does not only affect ‘other people’ and, above all, to put a stop to it.
For this is not an isolated incident… the day before this attack, another woman went through the same ordeal in the stadium car park.
For this mother, one thing is certain: beyond the theft of the car, the image of her child being snatched away for a few moments by an armed stranger will remain with her. And that fear does not go away just because you’ve found your keys.
The island that has always been known as the ‘Friendly Island’ is sinking into crime, and whatever the authorities may say in their attempts to reassure us, the violence is very much present. The local population now experiences it on a daily basis, in broad daylight… but it is also up to this very same population to wake up, to educate its young people and not let them go astray.
