Overview
- A 20-year-old was placed under formal investigation for aggravated vehicular homicide and aggravated injuries and was remanded in custody, prosecutors said.
- Investigators confirmed the driver had used nitrous oxide and was traveling at excessive speed before a rear-end collision on Lyon's M7 that left one woman dead and five people injured, with canisters found in the car.
- Police continue to uncover large stockpiles, including 864 bottles and 1,700 balloons seized by a canine unit at a rented storage box in Limoges, after a mid-December record haul of about 3,500 bottles in Bondy and other arrests near Paris.
- France’s anti-narcotics office Ofast warns trafficking is expanding, while the gas remains largely legal nationwide except where local orders restrict it, despite a 2021 ban on sales to minors and in certain places.
- A driving-simulator experiment by 40 millions d’automobilistes found even small doses sharply lengthen reaction times and degrade control, as the justice minister backs classifying nitrous oxide as a controlled substance and broader measures are prepared without a fixed timetable.