Terror charges for five ‘accomplices’ of Nice truck attacker, who plotted atrocity for months: prosecutor

The truck driver who killed 84 people on a Nice promenade had accomplices and appears to have been plotting his attack for months, the Paris prosecutor said Thursday, citing text messages, more than 1,000 phone calls and video of the attack scene on the phone of one of five people facing terror charges.

The Paris prosecutor’s office said five people were handed preliminary terrorism charges Thursday night for their alleged roles in helping 31-year-old Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel in the July 14 attack in the southern French city.

Prosecutor Francois Molins’ office, which oversees terrorism investigations, opened a judicial inquiry Thursday into a battery of charges for the suspects, including complicity to murder and possessing weapons tied to a terrorist enterprise.

Details about the investigation came as France’s interior minister faced criticism that a faulty security plan may have opened the way for the truck attack and as France extended its state of emergency for six months.

The prosecutor said the investigation made “notable advances” since the Bastille Day attack by Bouhlel, a Tunisian who had been living legally in Nice for years. Bouhlel was killed by police after barreling his 19-tonne truck down Nice’s famed Promenade des Anglais, mowing down those who had come to see holiday fireworks.