Fake Brav-M police invited on television, the prefecture takes legal action

Four people, faces and voices masked, all dressed in black and wearing orange “police” armbands. Invited to the set of Cyril Hanouna’s TPMP show, they present themselves as “members of Brav-M and special units” and are there to “break (ir) silence”, as indicated by a banner in bottom of the screen. Except that… everything would be false, according to the Paris police headquarters.

“The first elements in our possession suggest that these people do not belong to the BRAV-M (Brigade for the repression of violent actions – motorcyclist)”, reacted the police headquarters (PP) in a tweet, Friday March 31, shortly after the broadcast of this sequence. The prefect of police, Laurent Nunez, announced the opening of an administrative investigation and the referral to justice.

For its part, the Union of Commissioners of the National Police (SCPN) also wanted prosecution. “Your show is a disgrace, defamatory, slanderous, and an insult against the police of all France”says the union in a tweet.

A fired ex-policeman

On Saturday morning, the C8 channel (Canal+ group, controlled by Vincent Bolloré) on which this program is broadcast, admitted to Agence France-Presse that “of the four, one was revoked in December”.

According to several sources familiar with the matter, this man, who appeared as the spokesperson on the set, was stationed in Seine-Saint-Denis, before being dismissed from the police. He was affiliated with the trade union Independent Professional Federation of the National Police (FPIP), classified on the far right.

Race for the audience and culture of “clash”, when TV damages public debate

C8 also recalled that on the air, “it was clarified that not all were part of the BRAV-M”. “We would like to make a small clarification, there are among us members of the BRAV-M and members of the specialized units who intervene in the maintenance of order and we have done this all our career”, had indeed said on the set one of these people. But according to concordant sources, none of them would have been a member of the BRAV-M, these motorcycle police units at the heart of criticism of the maintenance of order in the demonstrations against the pension reform. One would be stationed in Yvelines, another in Val-de-Marne and the third, a woman, in Seine-Saint-Denis. These three people would be relatives of the dismissed police officer.

Arcom, the media regulatory authority, said it had been “grabbed by viewers”. According to “usual procedure”she goes “view the sequence in question and instruct it if necessary”she clarified.

The C8 channel has been pinned many times by Arcom lately because of sequences broadcast on Cyril Hanouna’s controversial show. In early February, she was sentenced to a record fine of 3.5 million euros after the insults hurled live by her star host at LFI deputy Louis Boyard in November.