Post-mortem to determine if Paris attacker was on drugs

FRENCH officials have completed a post-mortem examination to determine whether a suspected Islamist extremist was drunk or high on drugs when he took a soldier hostage in Paris and was shot dead by her fellow patrolmen.

Suspect Ziyed Ben Belgacem stopped at a bar early on Saturday, about four hours before he first fired bird shot at traffic police.

About 90 minutes later, he attacked the military patrol at Orly Airport, causing panic and the shutdown of the French capital’s second-biggest airport.

A subsequent police search of his flat found cocaine, Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said.

Blood samples taken during yesterday’s post-mortem examination were to be screened for drugs and alcohol, the prosecutors’ office said. In an interview with French radio station Europe 1, a man identified as the suspect’s father said Belgacem was not a practising Muslim and drank alcohol.

‘My son was never a terrorist. He never attended prayer. He drank. But under the effects of alcohol and cannabis, this is where one ends up,’ said the father. Europe 1 did not give his name.

The Paris prosecutor’s office said Belgacem’s father was released from police custody overnight. His brother and a cousin were also released yesterday.

In a news conference on Saturday, Mr Molins said Belgacem called his father and brother early that morning, minutes after he fired bird shot at a police traffic patrol, injuring an officer in the face, to say he had made a stupid mistake.

‘He called me at seven, eight in the morning and said, “there you go, Papa”. He was extremely angry, even his mother couldn’t understand him,’ the man identified as the father said on Europe 1.

The 39-year-old Frenchman had a long criminal record, with multiple jail terms for drugs and robbery offences.