French killer linked to Islamic terror group, investigators say
Attack adds anxiety to French election, security concerns
The gunman who shot a Paris police officerwas carrying a note defending the Islamic State.
PARIS — The gunman who shot and killed a police officer on the Champs-Elysees days before the French presidential vote spent 14 years in prison, including for attacking other officers, France’s anti-terrorism prosecutor said Friday — a lengthy criminal history that gave a jolt to an already nail-biting election and fueled growing security concerns.
Yet, despite an arrest as recently as February, the assailant, Karim Cheurfi, 39, had shown no signs of radicalization, Paris Prosecutor Francois Molins said, and was released for lack of evidence of a threat.
That all changed Thursday when Cheurfi, a Frenchman born in the Paris suburbs, opened fire with a Kalashnikov assault rifle on the boutique-lined boulevard synonymous with French glamour, striking a police officer with two bullets to the head and wounding two others before being shot and killed by police.
Security forces found a note praising the Islamic State group at the scene of the attack, which apparently fell fromthe gunman’s pocket.
That, along with a claim of responsibility by the Islamic State group was the only sign that he had entered the world of Islamic extremists, Molins said.
Scraps of paper scrawled with the addresses of police stations and a satchel of weapons, munitions and the Muslim holy book were discovered in his car.
Thursday’s shootings followed the arrest this week of two men in Marseille on suspicion of plotting an attack around Sunday’s first-round presidential vote, fueling France’s worst fear — a terrorist attack as crowds gather at polling stations across the nation.
Polls suggest a tight race among the four top contenders, with far-right nationalist Marine Le Pen — who rails at France’s Socialist government for being lax on crime — and Emmanuel Macron, an independent centrist and former economy minister, in the lead.
But conservative former Prime Minister Francois Fillon, whose campaign was initially derailed by corruption allegations that his wife was paid as his parliamentary aide, appeared to be closing the gap, as was far-leftist, Jean-Luc Melenchon.
U.S. President Donald Trump waded into the fray Friday, asserting that the attack will stoke Le Pen’s chances.
“She’s the strongest on borders, and she’s the strongest on what’s been going on in France,” Trump said in the Oval Office, noting that he was not endorsing the far-right candidate.
“Whoever is the toughest on radical Islamic terrorism, and whoever is the toughest at the borders, will do well in the election,” he said.
Le Pen, who wants France to exit the EU, says her firstmove if elected will be to regain control of the nation’s borders, something she says is a crucial component of sovereignty and a way to end what she calls a “sieve” for terrorists.
France is part of a treaty for a borderless Europe, allowing travelers to freely come and go.
Le Pen has hammered at the security issue, and on Friday she demanded the government re-establish border controls.
Bernard Cazeneuve, the Socialist prime minister, accused Le Pen of electoral opportunism in the face of a tragedy. He noted that Le Pen’s National Front party voted against ananti-terrorism lawin 2014 and, in 2015, against a lawthat beefed up resources for French intelligence services.
Campaigning by the 11 presidential candidates got off to a slow start, bogged downby corruption charges around once-top candidate Fillon before belatedly switching focus to France’s biggest fear: a new attack.
The French president will be chosen in a runoff of the top two candidates May 7.
Sunday’s vote is being held under a state of emergency, in place since terror attacks in 2015. Security is tight, with some 50,000 police and gendarmes joining 7,000 soldiers deployed around the nation for the vote.
But it was unclear whether Thursday’s deadly assault would sway or dissuade the legions of undecided voters.
“Nothing must hamper this democratic moment, essential for our country,” Cazeneuve said after a highlevel meeting Friday that reviewed the government’s security plans.
Theattack appeared to fit a pattern of European extremists targeting security forces and symbols of state to discredit, take vengeance on or destabilize society.
It recalled recent attacks on French soldiers providing security at prominent locations around Paris such as the Louvre in February and at Paris’ Orly airport last month.
The slain police officer was identified as Xavier Jugele by a French association of LGBT police officers. Its president, Mickael Bucheron, said he would have been 38 in May.