A mentally challenged Algerian culture-enricher had an “Allahu Akhbar” moment outside a school in Switzerland, but timely intervention prevented him from causing any harm.

Many thanks to Gary Fouse for translating this article from the Swiss daily Le Temps:

The threatening individual at Cortaillod will be expelled from Switzerland

The man who caused panic in a grammar school will be expelled from the country. The terrorist hypothesis is definitely ruled out.

The threatening man arrested on December 8 near a school in Cortaillod (NE-Neuchatel) will be expelled from Switzerland. The 25-year-old Algerian will be escorted to the German border, the location of his initial asylum request. He will be handed over to the authorities of that country, who will take charge of him. The Neuchatel Public Prosecutor’s Office announced on Friday they have opened a criminal investigation for threats against the population. It will next issue a ruling after taking into consideration both the nature of the facts as well as the personal situation of the accused.

The young man, who behaved in a verbally threatening manner, had filed his first asylum request in Germany and then transited several European countries under different identities. “As of today, no connection to terrorism has been established, and the subject is not the object of any alerts within the European Union in this context,” one can read in the statement from the police and the Neuchatel Public Prosecutor’s Office.

“The judicial record of the accused concerns small and mid-size criminality. The behavioral problems of this individual, notably observed by the personnel of the Boudry Reception Center upon his arrival, have been confirmed by a medical diagnosis,” the police and Public Prosecutor’s Office added. The applicant had arrived in the canton of Neuchatel only a few days before the incident.

Administrative detention

“After being medically stabilized in a secure environment, the subject was transferred today in a state of administrative detention outside the canton of Neuchatel with a view to his removal from our country,” the police and Public Prosecutor’s Office stated.

The “Amok” Protocol (prevention of attacks in schools) had been triggered after the individual shouted “Allahu Akhbar” in a threatening manner. “The teachers of the school reacted in an optimal way, thus protecting the children from a confrontation with this individual, who did not penetrate the school establishment and who was quickly intercepted by police,” according to elements of the statement.