French police combed Paris as part of a manhunt for a gunman who opened fire at the headquarters of a French newspaper on Monday. The same man is believed to be responsible for later firing shots outside of a French bank, as well as breaking into the office of the 24-hour news channel, BFMTV, on Friday. According to the BBC, “Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said the ‘most likely possibility’ was that a lone gunman was behind the three attacks and the hijacking.”
Security cameras captured the man entering the news channel with a shotgun last week.
Here’s more on the morning’s shooting from the New York Times:
Shortly after 10 a.m. on Monday, the gunman went through the front entrance of Libération, a left-leaning national daily, fired two blasts from a shotgun and fled, according to witnesses. A 27-year-old photographer’s assistant was critically wounded in the stomach and chest, the newspaper reported on its website…Shortly after the shooting at Libération, a man fired three blasts from a shotgun outside the high-rise headquarters of the bank Société Générale, in the La Défense business district just west of Paris, according to witnesses and the bank. No injuries were reported.
Police reports say, France 24 reports, after firing shots outside of the bank, “the man then forced a driver to take him to France’s most famous street, the boutique-dotted Champs-Elysées, where he disappeared into a metro station.” According to the Wall Street Journal, the man briefly taken hostage, told police “that his assailant claimed to have a hand grenade and said he had just gotten out of jail.”
The French capital was on lockdown into Monday night, as police have encouraged the city’s residents to stay indoors. Police have also been deployed to all of the main media outlets’ offices in the city. French police have released photos of the gunman and asked for help from the public in identifying him.
