3 Women Stabbed in Paris, Suspect Arrested

A police car in Reims, France, on May 25, 2022. Jose Hernandez/ShutterstockPARIS—A 31-year-old man armed with two knives stabbed three women in northwestern Paris on the morning of July 27, the Paris prosecutor’s office said.Shortly before 11:30 a.m., the man “successively attacked three pedestrians on the public street” near the Porte de Clichy tramway stop, the prosecutor’s office said in a statement to The Epoch Times.He “was arrested at 11:35 a.m. by an off-duty police officer” and placed in custody on suspicion of attempted murder, it added.The National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office has been notified, the statement said.Local French media have reposted a social media video showing the alleged suspect, pinned to the ground and appearing disoriented, quietly saying: “It is Allah who ordered me.”Two in Critical ConditionThe women, who were 19, 24, and 36 years old, were attacked between the brasserie Les Deux Coupoles and the tram stop, in the capital’s 17th arrondissement. They “were taken into the care of first responders and transported to a hospital,” the Paris police prefecture said.Two of the women, wounded in the lower back and the abdomen, were classified as “absolute emergencies,” the most serious category used by French rescue services. The third was listed as a relative emergency.None of the three is in life-threatening condition, Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said at midday after the government’s weekly Cabinet meeting.One of the victims is pregnant, according to Geoffroy Boulard, the mayor of the 17th arrondissement.The man, with a knife in each hand, was spotted by the off-duty police officer as he moved around the tramway station.The officer called for backup and tailed the man before arresting him with the help of an arriving police unit and passersby who helped pin him to the ground, according to local media reports.“Immense respect to our off-duty colleague, who intervened with composure to neutralize the assailant and prevent an even more dramatic toll,” the Alliance police union wrote on X.Motive Under InvestigationThe suspect gave investigators a self-declared identity that has yet to be verified and was “making incoherent remarks,” Nunez said.The minister urged the public to “remain very cautious about the motives of this extremely violent act.”The Paris prosecutor’s office has custody of the suspect, it told The Epoch Times.The National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office takes over an investigation only when a terrorist motive is determined. The fact that the office has been notified does not in itself mean the attack has been classified as an act of terrorism.The suspect remained in custody as of Monday afternoon.