French investigating judges have ordered the case against Mohammed Mogouchkov to be referred to a special assize court. Three years have passed since the attack on a school in Arras. Mogouchkov, who was born in Ingushetia, was 20 at the time of the attack. He is accused of murdering teacher Dominique Bernard and attempting to murder other members of the school staff. He faces a possible life sentence if convicted.

The attack took place on 13 October 2023. Mogouchkov entered the Gambetta-Carnot school, where he had previously been a pupil, armed with knives. He killed Dominique Bernard, a 57-year-old teacher of French language and literature, and wounded three other members of staff.

During questioning, Mogouchkov said he had deliberately chosen his former teacher as a target. According to his account, French lessons promote attachment to the Republic, democracy and human rights. This quotation is translated from his testimony in French, published with reference to the investigation files.

According to French media reports, before the attack Mogouchkov recorded a video pledging allegiance to the Islamic State, a terrorist organisation banned in Russia, and referred to the war between Israel and Hamas. France’s Interior Minister at the time, Gérald Darmanin, said intelligence information suggested a possible link between the attack and events in the Middle East.

Mogouchkov moved to France with his family as a child. Before the attack, he was under surveillance by the security services over suspicions of radicalisation, but the police had no grounds to arrest him. After the attack, it emerged that his older brother had previously been convicted under terrorism legislation.

Mogouchkov’s younger brother and a cousin were also investigated in connection with the case. The younger brother was suspected of complicity, while the cousin was accused of knowing about the planned attack but failing to report it. The investigating judges decided not to refer their cases to trial, concluding that there was insufficient evidence. France’s National Anti-Terrorist Prosecutor’s Office intends to appeal the decision. Neither relative has been acquitted; the proceedings against them have simply not reached trial.

After the attack, Mogouchkov’s younger sister told the French press that her brother had subjected her to psychological pressure and violence on religious grounds. She also said that he had beaten their mother. Their father had been deported from France because he intended to travel to Syria to fight for the Islamic State. The family had lived without him since 2018.

Mogouchkov’s mother had sought permission to join the investigation as a civil party. She argued that, following the teacher’s murder, she and her older daughter had been forced to leave their former home, while she had also lost the right to raise her younger daughter. The court rejected her application, ruling that the harm she had suffered was indirect.