July 14 trial: François Hollande and Bernard Cazeneuve at the helm this Monday, October 10

The stories of victims have been repeated at the bar of the specially composed assize court since September 21, when the hearings of the civil parties began.

However, the words, welcomed with benevolence, however strong they may be, struggle to convey the power of the suffering endured by the victims of the July 14, 2016 attack in Nice.

Guilt, hate, disgust

All of them, survivors, relatives of victims, psychological victims, progress – or stagnate – on an interminable ridge line. For six years. A long descent into hell, the doors of which opened wide, in a fraction of a second, this festive evening on the Promenade des Anglais, where 86 people died.

And, even if each story told has its nuances, if there are as many stories as victims, they end up being similar. By assembling. Like the pieces of a scary and sad jigsaw puzzle.

There is first this “guilt” of the survivor, “why him, her, them… and not me?”. That of the psychologically injured, “Do I have the right to be a victim?”. This “head-eating guilt”. There is disgust. against yourself, “I only thought about saving my life”, against the administration which, often, crushed, without wanting it, what the truck had wanted to save. Or against politicians who have made this torrent of suffering a “plan com”.

Securing the Prom’ in question

There is also hatred and anger, which we sometimes blame ourselves for feeling, “Yes I have hatred, I don’t want it, but I have hatred”, “my hatred, I keep it. My anger, I treat it”. Hope too, that the trial will be the cement of a beginning of “reconstruction.”

Finally, there is the omnipresent, burning question of securing the Promenade des Anglais on the evening of the fireworks. This is not the subject of the debates which are held until mid-December and the victims know it, but it does not matter. All expressed it. Or almost. Like Celia Viale.

The young woman, a textile artist, has lost her mother. Determined: “As long as the Nice instruction on security and its flaws does not lead to a trial, we will be angry. Mr. President, you said that this trial was not that of the institutions. I hear. But when will the trial of the institutions be then?”.

The debates resume this Monday morning at 9:30 a.m. and the court takes a break in the hearings of the victims. Make way for some of these “institutions”, precisely.

Organ harvesting

François Molins, anti-terrorism prosecutor at the time of the attack, will come to the bar, quoted by Promenade des Anges. Many victims hope for answers to the organ harvesting carried out on their loved ones, without consent and disproportionate, they denounce.

In the afternoon, the former Head of State François Hollande and his Minister of the Interior at the time, Bernard Cazeneuve, will take his place in turn. They have all three already testified at the bar of the trial of the Paris attacks of November 13.