Riot officers outside the local police station in Aulnay-sous-Bois on Monday. The graffiti on the wall reads, "Fuck the police."

A French police officer was charged Sunday with allegedly using his baton to sodomize a man during a check of his identity papers, an incident that has prompted outraged protests in the ethnically diverse northern suburbs of Paris.

Three other officers were charged with assault in connection with the incident on Thursday, the country's Ministry of Interior announced.

The officers have denied the charges against them, according to France Info.



The 22-year-old man, identified only as Theo, was allegedly stopped by the officers in the immigrant-rich suburb of Aulnay-sous-Bois, north of Paris, when he was sodomized with the baton, according to his lawyer, Eric Dupond-Moretti.

"It's a very serious matter," Dupond-Moretti told the radio station France Inter on Monday. "He was stopped by four cops who beat him — there was blood on the walls — and a baton was introduced into the anus of this young man. His pants down, having fallen by accident."

The attorney said his client, who is being treated in a hospital, was not known to police.