Killer of French Teacher Acknowledges His Intentions on Twitter

On Saturday, the French counterterrorism prosecutor, Jean-Francois Ricard, said that the 18-year-old who beheaded a history teacher in front of his school spoke to his students on the street and asked them to identify his victim.

Police shot dead the Moscow-born student after he killed the history teacher Samuel Patty, 47, in the Conflans-Saint-Honorine suburb on Friday.

Reuters quoted Ricard, saying that a picture of the teacher’s body, which the attacker posted on Twitter, was found attached to a message on his phone after police killed him. He added that the account belonged to the attacker.

Twitter quickly deleted the post and said it closed the account for violating company policy, according to Reuters.

Ricard said during a press conference that the attacker, who was of Chechen origin, was living in the town of Evre, northwest of Paris, and was not known by the intelligence services.

The prosecutor confirmed that the police were holding nine people in connection with the attack.

The murder shocked the country and reminded its people with the attack on the headquarters of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo five years ago.

Police sources said that four relatives of the attacker, including a minor, were arrested in the hours following the attack.

Police also arrested five others over night, including two parents of students at the College de Bois de Lone school.