Witnessing an attack is not being a victim!

During the 2016 attack in Nice, two witnesses near the place where the truck had entered the crowd sent a request to the Fund for the Protection of Victims of Terrorism and Other Crimes (FGTI) for compensation for their injuries, claiming that they had suffered psychological repercussions as a result of the attack.

The FGTI does not accept this claim for compensation, on the grounds that these two persons were not at the site of the attack. In the event of such a refusal, an appeal is brought before the court of first instance and then before the court of appeal.

The Court of Appeal ruled that these two witnesses could not be considered victims of terrorism and could not claim compensation, since they were 400 meters away from the place where the attack had ended and they had at no time been directly exposed to an objective risk of death or bodily harm, a condition for the application of Article L126-1 of the Insurance Code. As a result, the court does not accept their claim for compensation.

The case was then brought before the Court of Cassation, the applicants taking the view that it was sufficient to have been exposed to the risk and not that the risk had occurred for the status of victim of an act of terrorism to be recognized.

The Court of Cassation dismisses the appeal on the ground that victimswithin the meaning of Article L126-1 of the Insurance Code, people who have been directly exposed to objective risk of death or bodily harm and that the fact that a person has been close to and witnessing the scene of an attack is not in itself sufficient to confer on him the status of victim.