French vigilante beating leaves Roma teen burglary suspect in coma

PARIS – French anti-discrimination groups are demanding government action in response to an attack against a Roma teenager, who was left for dead after a group of people who suspected him of burglary seized him from his camp and beat him into unconsciousness.

Luc Poignant, a police union official, tells LCI television in an interview aired Tuesday that about a dozen people went into the Roma camp late Friday in Pierrefitte-sur-Seine after an apartment was burglarized. Police found the victim abandoned by a road.

Poignant said the young man was put into a medically induced coma "because he was in so much pain."

Anti-racism groups say violence in France is rising against Roma migrants, also known as Gypsies, who come primarily from Eastern Europe and are often blamed for petty crime.