Teacher stabbed to death by ‘possessed’ pupil in French classroom

A teacher at a Roman Catholic school in southwest France was killed on Wednesday in a stabbing attack by a teenage pupil who claimed he was possessed. 

The teacher, who taught Spanish and was in her 50s, was giving the class at the school in the town of Saint-Jean-de-Luz when the pupil attacked her with a knife. 

Pupils fled in panic after the stabbing, local newspaper Sud Ouest said. 

According to BFM TV, the student then left the scene and entered the neighbouring classroom, where another teacher succeeded in disarming him without incident. 

During negotiations, the student was calm and reportedly told the second teacher that he was possessed, and that “voices” told him to stab her.

The teacher stayed with the 16-year-old student until police arrived on scene.

The victim was given emergency aid at the scene, but Bayonne prosecutor Jerome Bourrier told AFP she died of her wounds.

“My thoughts are with the family, colleagues and the pupils. I will be going to the site straight away,” said Education Minister Pap Ndiaye. 

Saint-Thomas-d’Aquin is a private Catholic school in the fishing town of Saint-Jean-de-Luz, where the assailant earned good grades and was unknown to police. The school, which is a combined middle and high school and has about 1,100 students, was placed under lockdown for two hours and re-opened around mid-day.

Government spokesperson Olivier Veran also expressed his condolences on Twitter: “No words can describe the tragedy that occurred in Saint-Jean-de-Luz. My thoughts for the teacher’s family, her students and for the entire educational community.”

For some, the violent incident drew comparisons to the shocking murder of Samuel Paty in 2020, a high school teacher who was beheaded by an Islamic terrorist of Chechen origin after showing caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad in class.

David Lisnard, the Republican mayor of Cannes was quick to evoke Paty’s murder and call out an increasingly violent society on Twitter.

“Three years ago Samuel Paty was murdered on leaving school. This morning it was a teacher from St-Jean-de-Luz who lost her life after being stabbed in her class by a student. Full support to the victim’s family, faculty and students,” he tweeted.

“It’s hard to put emotion aside when school is the theatre of horror. But it is clear, while waiting for the ‘motivations’ of the murderer, that the violence that plagues our society no longer knows any borders. The state must protect our teachers,” he added.