Flailing and struggling amid a brutal assault, this is the moment the daughter of a major cryptocurrency company executive and her two-year-old child were the victims of a violent attempted kidnapping in Paris.
The 34-year-old was walking down Rue Pache in the capital yesterday morning when three armed men approached her.
The group tried to force her and her toddler into a white van after hitting the child’s father, who tried to intervene.
Footage filmed by an onlooker from his apartment window also shows the woman – believed to be the daughter of a top crypto exec – grab a handgun belonging to the attackers before throwing it away.
In the footage, as he is being beaten, the father appears to be yelling, ‘Help! She’s pregnant!’
The victims’ screams eventually attracted attention, however, leading the attackers to flee in their van.
Passers-by can be seen arriving on the scene ready to assist as the assailants scrambled to freedom, with one desperately throwing a fire extinguisher at the van.
The vehicle was later abandoned on a nearby street, according to Le Parisien. The outlet also said the child, who did not appear in the videom had tear gas in his eyes.
The 34-year-old was walking down Rue Pache in the capital yesterday morning when three armed men approached her
The victims’ screams eventually attracted attention, however, leading the attackers to flee in their van
The group had tried to force her and her toddler into a white van after hitting the child’s father, who tried to intervene
In the footage, as he is being beaten, the father appears to be yelling, ‘Help! She’s pregnant!’
Passers-by can be seen arriving on the scene ready to assist as the assailants scrambled to freedom
One witness, 61-year-old Jean-Jacques, said: ‘I heard screaming so I went outside.
‘I saw hooded and armed men running away and I turned my head and saw a man with a bloody head, he was lying on the ground. There was blood everywhere.
‘I cauterized the wound.’
Another witness, a local worker, suggested the public response helped drive off the attackers, adding: ‘There were lots of people at the windows. Some filmed the scene. Many were yelling [to] call the police.’
The Paris Judicial Police’s Anti-Banditism Brigade (BRB) has now been called in to investigate an attempted kidnapping.
The armed assailants are being hunted, but police have not yet revealed any details behind their motives.
However, the incident follows another cryptocurrency related kidnapping in the capital just days earlier.
On May 1, the father of a crypto entrepeneur spent more than 48 hours in a Paris building after being taken captive.
During the incident, the victim was injured and a ransom demand for several million was made, according to French media.
His finger was cut off, wth his captors filming the horrific act to send to his son.
Eventually, police smashed down the door and used non-lethal grenades to apprehend the kidnappers.
Five people have now been arrested and taken into custody.
The incident has also sparked concerns about the wider safety of tourists and residents in the French capital
France has seen scores of violent demonstrations. Pictured, a protestor runs amid clashes over the fatal police shooting of a 17-year-old driver in the Paris suburb of Nanterre in 2023
Bruno Retailleau, the interior minister, said in relation to a previous crypto-related kidnapping: ‘A huge congratulations to the investigators who did an exceptional job freeing this man and arresting his captors’
Bruno Retailleau, the interior minister, wrote at the time: ‘A huge congratulations to the investigators who did an exceptional job freeing this man and arresting his captors.’
A police source said the victim’s wife told investigators that her husband and son, who owned a crypto marketing firm in Malta, had received threats in the past.
In January, David Balland, a co-founder of French crypto firm Ledger, had his hand mutilated while he and his wife were kidnapped and held captive for severla hours.
The couple were found a day later after being tortured by the kidnappers, who demanded a €10 million ransom.
And last December, the 56-year-old father of a French cryptocurrency influencer based in Dubai was the target of an alleged kidnapping in eastern France, local media reported.
Attackers arrived at the man’s home, tied up his wife and daughter and forced him into a car.
He was only discovered 24 hours later, tied up in the boot of a car in Normandy.
Cryptocurrency holders in other nations have also been targeted by opportunistic criminals.
Last November, three teenagers lured a man in Las Vegas after a crypto event he hosted and abducted him at gunpoint at his home before forcing him into a car and driving him into the desert.
They gained access to his crypto wallets and drained $4 million worth of cryptocurrency and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
In Canada in 2022, self-proclaimed ‘Crypto-King’ Aiden Pleterski was kidnapped in downtown Toronto by victims of his alleged Ponzi scheme.
The incident has also sparked concerns about the wider safety of tourists and residents in the French capital.
Today Kim Kardashian is giving evidence to a court in Paris in the trial of 10 people accused of robbing her at gunpoint in the Hotel de Pourtales in 2016.
Jewels worth millions of dollars were taken, including a $4m (£2.9m) diamond engagement ring.
The 44-year-old media personality and businesswoman was tearful as she told the judge: ‘I was certain he [one of the robbers] was going to rape me.
‘I absolutely did think I was going to die.’
Late last month French lawmakers approved a sweeping counter-narcotics law to equip the state with tougher tools to fight a sharp rise in drug crime.
The new law will create a national prosecutor’s office for organised crime, isolate dangerous kingpins in prisons to prevent them from running their empires from behind bars, and allow for the shutdown of businesses that launder drug money.
Today Kim Kardashian is giving evidence to a court in Paris in the trial of 10 people accused of robbing her at gunpoint in the Hotel de Pourtales in 2016
Drug gangs have caused havoc across France in recent months, carrying out coordinated machine-gun and arson attacks on seven prison
Prisons in Toulon, Aix-En-Provence, Marseille, Valence and Nîmes in southern France, and in Villepinte and Nanterre, near Paris, were attacked last month
It came after a Senate report warned France faced a ‘tipping point’ from rising drug violence.
Using the same phrase, Retailleau said last year: ”The ‘narco thugs’ have no limits anymore… These shootouts aren’t happening in South America, they’re happening in Rennes, in Poitiers… we’re at a tipping point.’
Drug gangs have caused havoc across France in recent months, carrying out coordinated machine-gun and arson attacks on seven prisons.
Prisons in Toulon, Aix-En-Provence, Marseille, Valence and Nîmes in southern France, and in Villepinte and Nanterre, near Paris, were attacked last month.
Ministers have been scrambling for solutions amid a rise in the murder rate in recent years.
In 2023, the number of murders increased by seven per cent to 1,110 cases – almost double the UK figure.
The same year, hate crimes ‘of a racist nature’ rose by almost a third to 15,000.
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