Trial of November 13: the logbook of an ex-hostage of the Bataclan, week 7 – Franceinfo

On November 13, 2015, David Fritz-Goeppinger was at the Bataclan when the concert hall was attacked by three men, armed with assault rifles and explosive belts. “Never again in my life will I forget these faces”, David confides. Taken hostage for two and a half hours, he thinks every minute that his time has come. Until the assault of the BRI police. That night, the coordinated attacks on the Stade de France, the terraces of the 10th and 11th arrondissements of Paris and the Bataclan, left 130 dead, including 90 in the concert hall, and more than 400 injured. Almost six years later, it is the trial of these attacks which is held in Paris. David Fritz-Goeppinger, now a photographer, has agreed to share via this logbook his feelings, in image and in writing, during the long months that the historic trial of these November 13 attacks that marked France. Here is his account of the seventh week.

>> The journal of the sixth week

Wednesday October 20. It is Wednesday when I write this post. A little while ago on my way to the Palace, I came across two posters in the metro: the first, that of the future Eagles of Death Metal concert at the Olympia and a few meters further on the poster for Eddy de Pretto’s concert at the Bataclan. A sort of beacon of a daily life that never stops. Yesterday, it was up to us, the soups to drop off at the bar.

I go to the Palace accompanied by my wife and my closest friend. It is past noon by a few minutes when we find the “soups” in the pas perdus room. I directly recognize the tall figure of Grégory and his usual red scarf, I see Stéphane from behind, accompanied by two of his daughters and his partner. Seeing my friends again relieves me, we will not be alone. We sit at the front of the benches for the civil parties, Caroline, Marie and Grégory are seated behind us while Stéphane has chosen a seat further back. Sébastien arrives just after and settles down where he can, followed by his partner. The hearing of the day is almost exclusively reserved for ex-hostages but it is Daniel Psenny who opens the proceedings. It was he who, on the evening of November 13, shot a video from his window. On this one, we see people fleeing from the room as well as three figures hanging from two windows, it is Sébastien, the pregnant woman and me. Daniel gives us details of the start of his evening and then the video is shown. A cold breath sweeps through the courtroom. I have a feeling everyone is taking a deep breath. During the video, the courtroom becomes a window on the passage Saint-Pierre Amelot on November 13, 2015. During the projection, I try glances over my shoulder and see dozens of eyes looking at the screens. retransmission. The video cuts, Daniel Psenny speaks again.

I am aware that I will be the next civil party to file and I am struggling to keep my calm. The president’s voice echoes: David Fritz-Goeppinger. After a last gesture to my friends, I run down the central passageway to the glass desk facing the courtyard. From where I am, I know that behind me stand all of my most precious friends and allies. A fleeting thought crosses my mind during my testimony. I have the impression that all the paths of my life have led me to this precise place and place and that this will undoubtedly be the last time that I will bear witness to the facts in such detail. Despite the pressure, I try to observe the people in front of me, the president, the court, the court designers scribbling their drawing paper.

Returning to my seat, I observe Grégory getting up to take my place, I take the opportunity to kiss him. After him, Caroline and after her, Sébastien and finally Arnaud and Marie. The sound of our voices inside the hall echoes loudly. For the first time, we are all together to tell our November 13th. Over the years, soups have become part of a whole family. I think of Stéphane’s words not long ago: “It is often said that the family we do not choose, but it is as if this one had been chosen”. We had nothing in common except a love of music and rock. Our little group seems to be a fairly comprehensive sample of the range of backgrounds of those present at the Bataclan that evening. First, we first rebuilt our evening. Some hand pieces of memory to others, while some listen intently. Today, after having dissected the past, we are building together our present and our future. It is this singularity that will always accompany us, even in the heart of the sanctuary represented by the Palais de Justice in Paris. It is our lawyer, Maître Aurélie Coviaux, who photographs us as we leave the courtroom at around 7 p.m., in my mind three words appear: “Together, stronger.”

This morning, I feel relieved of a weight and I feel that the burden I have carried for years is crumbling like layers of sedimentary rock on a hill. For a long time, I wondered what I would do with this burden. The writing arrived, followed by the photography. These mechanisms of transformation of my trauma accompany me every day and push me to tell you about my daily life and my thoughts. Yesterday, I said to a friend: I’m trying to recycle, you know me … Thinking this morning, I realize that the word “to file” involves the fact of leaving somewhere, an object that may or may not be bulky but that you want or need to get rid of. However, these same mechanisms oblige me to keep pieces of it to give them a new life, a new function.

Today, I come to the Palace almost exclusively to attend the testimony of a friend, Aurélia. I met her a while ago. I attend his testimony from a broadcast room and take out my notebook to continue to blacken its pages. At the helm, Aurélia is factual and I am impressed by the calm and the weight with which she testifies. Her voice, calm, contrasts with the terrible words she utters. She concludes her testimony by saying: “Terrorism turns us into an object. I needed to become a subject again. And testifying today is a way of becoming a subject again.

I leave the palace around 5 pm. From where I am sitting, the inhabitants of the Palace continue to swarm in front of me. Streetlights are on which gives the hall of lost steps the appearance of an alley on a winter evening. The lawyers walk around, phone to the ear while the civil parties discuss among themselves. In the sanctuary, life takes its course.

Today at the end of the day a new stage of the trial began, the hearing of the relatives of the victims who died in the Bataclan attack.

I go home.