Councillor hit by petrol bottle outside Chelles lycée, attempted homicide probe opened

Attack outside the lycée

On Tuesday, 10 November 2026, regional councillor and deputy mayor of Chelles Angela Pascoa Dos Santos was hit in the chest by a bottle of petrol outside the Gaston-Bachelard lycée in Chelles, Seine-et-Marne. She told BFMTV that she had gone over after seeing young people try to set fire to rubbish bins, and that she moved in to stop them when the bottle struck her. The Meaux prosecutor said the impact knocked the breath out of her and forced her to the ground, and that a yellow liquid smelling of petrol spilled over her. The mayor, Brice Rabaste (LR), told BFMTV that the liquid soaked her coat. She had been at the school with elected parent representatives to mediate so that classes could resume, and she filed a complaint late that morning, the prosecutor's office said.

Investigation and arrests

The Meaux prosecutor opened an investigation for attempted intentional homicide on Tuesday. Three students aged 15 to 17 from the lycée were apprehended at the scene, but the prosecutor said none of them had been placed in police custody over the bottle. As of midday, the person who threw the bottle had not been identified.

The mayor said CCTV footage had identified people involved in the morning's violence, and that two had been arrested, including one for throwing petrol on a bin. Prosecutor Jean-Baptiste Bladier said in a statement that the councillor had been dealing with young people in front of the school when she was struck.

Political reaction

President Emmanuel Macron wrote on X that he gave his full support to the councillor and to Education National staff, especially school leadership, who face violence. He said that attacking an elected official of the Republic, or those who serve her, is unacceptable.

“Violence has no place in democracy.”

Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez also wrote on X that he condemned the attack, and he described the situation as urban violence rather than a student movement. Visiting a collège in Paris's 10th arrondissement, Education Minister Édouard Geffray called the behavior a crime and said the councillor must have the support of the whole political community. National Assembly president Yaël Braun-Pivet condemned the act 'with the greatest firmness', saying that anyone who attacks an elected official attacks democracy.

“We are no longer in the context of a student movement; these are urban violence, which calls for the firmest and most determined response.”

A wider wave of violence

Valérie Pécresse, the Les Républicains president of the Île-de-France region, said the number of blocked lycées had fallen while violence had intensified over the past ten days. She cited about a hundred mortar fires, nearly half of them inside school grounds, and around twenty injured among staff and students. She said the councillor was completely shaken and that the region would join the complaint for attempted murder as a civil party.

“This surge of violence must stop.”

Earlier, in early October, a man who teaches physics and chemistry was doused with petrol and struck during a student demonstration in La Ciotat, Bouches-du-Rhône.