Security breach at the Elysée

A MENTALLY-ILL homeless man was allowed to drive through security checks at the Elysée Palace by placing a blue flashing light on his dashboard.

The 36-year-old approached the main gates of the presidential palace, on Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré and was allowed inside, where he parked the car.

Stopped by security officials shortly afterwards, he was questioned at a police station and then taken to a psychiatric hospital.

The Renault Clio had previously been spotted driving dangerously in the Place de la Concorde, but police lost track of it, said Le Parisien.

The driver then turned up at the Elysée, where a police officer on duty alterted Republican guards at the gate, who would normally check the driver’s identity before opening a gate.

However, apparently impressed by his flashing light, they simply allowed the car to pass.

President Sarkozy, who is on holiday in the Var, has been informed of the incident and Elysée officials have dismissed the incident as banal. “The key thing is he was stopped,” a spokesman said. The police said it was “regrettable.”

The last publicised security alert was in December 2008 when guards at the gate wrestled a man to the ground as he tried to get into the palace with a taser and a knife. That time the story was broken in the British press, who called it an assassination attempt.

Photo: Eric Pouhier (Creative Commons)