2013 Paris attacks

On November 15, 2013, Dekar, acting alone, entered BFM-TV's news network station wielding a pump-action shotgun. He threatened journalists in the lobby briefly before leaving the station. It is unclear whether his weapon malfunctioned or if he chose not to shoot, but he left multiple unused cartridges and told witnesses, "Next time, I won't miss."[3]

On November 18, 2013 at 10 a.m., just three days after the initial attack, Dekar entered the headquarters of the Libération newspaper and opened fire.[3][4] During the attack, a 23-year-old freelance photographer was shot in the arm and chest. The gunman soon left and the victim was rushed to the hospital with critical injuries near his heart. Just two hours after the shooting at the Libération newspaper, two shots were fired outside the French bank, Société Générale. Soon after, witnesses described the shooter as wearing a khaki coat and hat. No one was injured.[1]

After fleeing from the site of the Société Générale shooting, Dekhar acquired a vehicle by taking a man hostage in the town of Pluteaux, near La Défense.[3][5] Dekar forced the man to drive three and a half miles towards central Paris before letting him go at the Champs-Élysées. The gunman continued to flee but was later arrested in an underground parking complex 6 miles north of Paris, in Bois-Colombes. Officials reported that the gunman was extremely incoherent due to multiple prescription medications that he had consumed within a short period of time. It was later reported by officials that he tried to attempt suicide this way.[6]

Abdelhakim Dekhar was born in 1965 in Algrange, France. The third of eleven children, it is widely believed that he was born into an extremely unstable family and was a troubled child. At an early age, he ran away from home and spent a short period of his childhood in sponsored care. At 17, he joined the military and served in the 9th Parachute Regiment. During his first trial in the 1990s, he explained to the judge that his service was cut short because he was recruited to work for the Algerian secret service. After his release from prison in the late 1990s for his involvement in the Rey-Maupin affair, Dekhar lived quietly in Britain.[9]

In 1998, Dekhar was sentenced to four years in prison for supplying the gun used by anarchist youths[8][10] in an attempted robbery in the 1994 Rey-Maupin affair, but was soon released, having already served most of his time before the verdict.[8][10]