French court rejects bid to reopen probe into black man’s death in custody

France’s highest court has refused to reopen an investigation into the 2016 death of Adama Traore, a young black man who died in police custody, upholding an earlier decision to dismiss the case against the three officers involved.

The Court of Cassation’s ruling effectively closes the case nearly a decade after the 24-year-old’s death in Beaumont-sur-Oise, a Paris suburb, which sparked national outrage over allegations of police brutality and racial discrimination.

Traore’s family had challenged a 2024 appeal court ruling that confirmed a previous decision to drop the case, following an investigation that found no grounds to charge the gendarmes involved. After Wednesday’s ruling, a lawyer representing the family said they would take the matter to the European Court of Human Rights to seek accountability.

Traore was pursued by three gendarmes on July 19, 2016, in extreme heat of nearly 37C. He was pinned down in an apartment, later reported difficulty breathing, and fainted en route to the gendarmerie, where he died. French investigators concluded that the death, likely caused by heatstroke, would “probably” not have been fatal without police intervention, and ruled the officers’ actions legally permissible.

The family disputes this, claiming the officers failed to assist Traore, who was found unconscious and handcuffed behind his back. In their appeal, they criticized the justice system for not reconstructing the events during the investigation, though prosecutors sought to dismiss the appeal.

The case highlights broader concerns over policing and racial discrimination in France, where internal investigations of officers are common and criminal prosecutions rare. Activists point to other incidents, including the 2023 death of Mauritanian worker El Hacen Diarra following a violent arrest, and the 2017 case of Theo Luhaka, who suffered irreversible injuries during a stop-and-search.

Europe’s top rights court also condemned France in June over racial profiling during police identity checks, marking the first ruling against the country for alleged discriminatory policing.