Suspect Arrested After Killing One in Trappes

Police arrested a 39-year-old man on Friday following a 15-minute shooting spree in the Paris suburb of Trappes that left one person dead and five others injured. The attacker, identified as Kevin T., drove through the communities of Trappes and La Verriere before being taken into custody. The assault occurred between 10:30 a.m. and 10:45 a.m. local time. Officials confirmed that the victim, Pengo Bassio Wangi, was a young Black man. Among the wounded is a 12-year-old girl of North African descent who was shot eight times and transported to a children's hospital for surgery. French media reported that the girl was wearing a headscarf at the time of the attack.

Interior Minister Laurent Nunez designated the incident a terrorist crime. Prosecutors are investigating whether the suspect conspired with a specific terrorist group. A member of the suspect's immediate family circle has also been detained. Investigators recovered a World War II-era semiautomatic weapon and tear gas grenades from the suspect's vehicle. Local MP Laurent Mazaury stated that the suspect told officers he intended to kill foreigners. Mazaury characterized the attacker as a racist individual.

Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu described the case as very serious and said all security resources were mobilized. President Emmanuel Macron called the event a racist terrorist attack and a turning point for the nation. He stated that France remains determined to fight racism in all its forms. Trappes mayor Ali Rabeh, who has Moroccan roots, said the gunman fired at random to cause a bloodbath. Rabeh noted that the victims could have been his own relatives. He said the wounded girl's crime was probably being of color.

The girl's mother told broadcaster RTL that she questioned whether her daughter was targeted because of her headscarf. She emphasized that the girl was born in Trappes and has the right to build her life in France. The mother asked how anyone could do this to a child. Prosecutors said three of the five injured people are in critical condition. The other two victims are in stable condition.

The attack occurs amid ongoing cost-of-living and student protests that have sometimes turned violent. Authorities plan to deploy 70,000 police officers on Saturday when more demonstrations are expected. Some far-right voices have blamed Muslim youths for the unrest. National Rally leader Marine Le Pen condemned the shooting as barbaric. Muslim groups accused the populist right of fostering hatred through Islamophobic rhetoric. They pointed to Le Pen's proposal to fine women who wear the headscarf in public. Rabeh called politicians who make negative comments about Muslims criminals.

The French Muslim Council blamed promoters of anti-Muslim hate speech, stating they have blood on their hands. Monitors report that anti-Muslim hostility is growing. Last week, the European Parliament passed a resolution by 381 votes to 167 with 15 abstentions. The resolution calls for an EU strategy against Islamist entryism and the Muslim Brotherhood network. Researcher Farid Hafez of Georgetown University's Bridge Initiative called the vote a major symbolic victory for anti-Muslim forces. Amnesty International said in June that Islamophobic violence in the United Kingdom had reached emergency levels. The EU's Fundamental Rights Agency states that one in two Muslims in Europe face racial discrimination. In the US, California's attorney general reported that anti-Muslim hate crimes rose 54 percent in 2025, from 24 to 38.