145 people jabbed with syringes at France street music festival after online calls to target women

As many as 145 people reported being pricked with syringes during an annual street music festival in France, officials said Sunday.

According to CBS news, authorities had reporting “unprecedented crowds” in Paris on Saturday as millions of people thronged the streets across France for the Fete de la Musique in the evening.

Before the party, posts on social media had called for women to be targeted during the festivities, the report added.

A feminist influencer, Abrège Soeur, had warned online before the festival that calls had been made on social media for women to be targeted with syringes, the Guardian reported. It was not certain where such posts would have been made or by whom.

France’s interior ministry said 145 victims across the country had reported being stabbed with “needles”. Paris police confirmed 13 cases in the capital.

Officials did not specify if these were cases of so-called needle spiking with date-rape drugs such as Rohypnol or GHB, used by attackers to render victims confused or unconscious and vulnerable to sexual assault.

“Some victims were taken to hospital for toxicological tests,” the French interior ministry was quoted by CBS news as saying. “The ministry is taking this very seriously,” a spokesperson from the interior ministry told CNN on Monday. “Toxicology tests are being done and the investigation is ongoing,” she added.

French police had detained 12 suspects in connection with the incident.

In Paris, investigations were launched after three people, including a 15-year-old girl and an 18-year-old male, reported being stabbed in separate incidents across Paris, prosecutors said. All three reported feeling unwell.

Across France, 12 suspects have been arrested, the interior ministry said. Among them were four people in the south-western city of Angoulême suspected of having targeted about 50 victims, a police source said.

There was a spate of such attacks in the U.K. and a number of other European nations about three years ago.