The French police have detained 12 suspects after 145 people reported being stabbed with syringes during the country’s annual street music festival Fête de la Musique.
Millions of people took to the streets across France on Saturday night for Fête de la Musique, authorities reporting „unprecedented crowds” in Paris. Prior to the event, social media posts encouraging attacks on women during the festivities surfaced.
The Interior Ministry stated that 145 victims from across the country reported being pricked with needles. The Paris police reported 13 cases, according to AFP.
Officials did not specify whether these were cases of so-called "needle pricks" with drugs used for rape, such as Rohypnol or GHB, used by attackers to induce confusion or unconsciousness in victims and make them vulnerable to sexual assaults.
"Some victims were taken to the hospital for toxicology tests," the ministry said.
In Paris, investigations were opened after three people, including a 15-year-old girl and an 18-year-old man, reported being pricked in separate incidents, prosecutors said. All three said they feel unwell.
Across France, 12 suspects have been detained, the French Interior Ministry said. Among them were four people from the city of Angoulême in the southwest of the country, suspected of attacking around 50 victims, a police source said. In addition to these suspects, over 370 people were detained during the festival on various charges, nearly 90 of them in Paris.
14 festival participants were seriously injured, including a 17-year-old teenager hospitalized after being found on the street with stab wounds in the lower abdomen.
13 law enforcement officers were also injured.