A car has ploughed into the outdoor terrace of a pizzeria in the small town of Sept-Sorts east of Paris, killing a 12-year-old girl and seriously injuring several others, French officials have said.
The driver deliberately targeted the diners, said a local prosecutor who announced he was ruling out terrorism and opening a murder investigation.
“There is no doubt that he voluntarily decided to create what happened,” prosecutor Eric de Valroger said at the scene of the incident.
Mr de Valroger said the driver was a 31-year-old from the nearby town of La Ferte-sous-Jouarre and it was “highly probable” he was under the influence of drugs.
Some officials said the dead girl was 13, while the prosecutor said she was 12.
Interior Ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet said the attacker was a “depressive” and described him as an unstable character.
The incident happened on a warm summer’s evening on the eve of a national holiday and witnesses said the outdoor eating area was busy.
A photo on social media showed a grey BMW car surrounded by upturned tables in the outdoor seating area of a restaurant.
Mr Brandet said five victims were being treated in hospital for life-threatening injuries. Eight others suffered minor injuries.
“Everyone on the terrace was hit,” one witness told BFM TV.
Man had earlier tried to take his own life: police source
The suspect is believed to have tried to kill himself last week, Mr Brandet said on BFM television.
He said the man was not known to intelligence or police.
French President Emmanuel Macron expressed condolences and support for the victims and survivors of the attack, according to an Interior Ministry statement.
The incident occurred less than a week after an Algerian national was arrested on suspicion of deliberately ramming a hire car into a group of soldiers on a patrol in the Paris suburb of Levallois-Perret, injuring six of them.
The soldiers were part of Operation Sentinel, launched in the wake of Islamist attacks in Paris in early 2015.
The Levallois-Perret attack was the 15th on troops and police in the last two-and-a-half years, many of them Islamic State-inspired. (Reuters/AP)
