The pastor of a church has been held by police after two people died following the collapse of part of the building during an Easter Sunday service.

"/> The pastor of a church has been held by police after two people died following the collapse of part of the building during an Easter Sunday service.

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Pastor held over church deaths

The pastor of a church has been held by police after two people died following the collapse of part of the building during an Easter Sunday service.

Published: 11 April 2012 09:55 CEST

A 47-year-old woman died from her injuries on Tuesday morning after the accident.

A six-year-old girl died on Sunday shortly after part of the floor collapsed.

A group of around 100 people were worshipping on the first floor of the building in Stains, in the northern Paris suburbs. Most were from the city’s Haitian community.

At around 1.30pm on Sunday afternoon around 30 square metres of the floor collapsed.

Worshippers fell around 2.5 metres (7.5 feet) and 32 people were injured. A third girl of two-years-old was still in a critical condition on Tuesday.

The pastor and the owner of the building were both taken in for questioning by police on Tuesday evening over the deaths.

Le Figaro newspaper reported the two were being questioned over “involuntary homicide and aggravated injury.”

The newspaper reported they had violated a “safety obligation” that applied to the building.

There have been suggestions that the building was not suited to a gathering of Sunday’s size or nature.

Le Figaro also reported a police source who claimed things were “very festive. People were praying, chanting and dancing.”

The town’s mayor has said that work carried out on the building several years ago was done without authorisation.

“The local authority noted in 2008 that an extension was built without the right authorisation,” said Michel Beaumale. 

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NORWAY

Body found in Oslo flat nine years after death

A man lay dead in his flat for nine years before being discovered in December, police in Oslo have said.

Published: 9 April 2021 11:20 CEST
Body found in Oslo flat nine years after death
Photo by pichet wong from Pexels

The man, who was in his sixties, had been married more than once and also had children, national broadcaster NRK reports.

His name has been kept anonymous. According to neighbours he liked to keep to himself and when they didn’t see him, they thought he had moved or been taken to assisted living.

“Based on the details we have, it is obviously a person who has chosen to have little contact with others,” Grethe Lien Metild, chief of Oslo Police District, told NRK.

His body was discovered when a caretaker for the building he was living in requested police open the apartment so he could carry out his work.

“We have thought it about a lot, my colleagues and people who have worked with this for many years. This is a special case, and it makes us ask questions about how it could happen,” Metild said.

Police believe the man died in April 2011, based on a carton of milk and a letter that were found in his apartment. An autopsy has shown he died of natural causes.

READ ALSO: Immigrants in Norway more likely to be affected by loneliness

His pension was suspended in 2018 when the Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration (NAV) could not get in touch with him, but his bills were still paid out of his bank account and suspended pension fund.

Arne Krokan, a professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, said the man’s death would have unlikely gone unnoticed for so long if he had died 30 years ago.

“In a way, it is the price we have paid to get digital services,” he said to NRK.

Last year 27 people were found in Oslo, Asker or Bærum seven days or more after dying. The year before the number was 32 people. Of these, one was dead for almost seven months before being discovered.

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