Two days after the massacre at Charlie Hebdo's offices, brothers Chérif and Saïd Kouachi were cornered in a printing plant in Dammartin-en-Goële; police stormed the building as they emerged firing. Almost simultaneously, Amedy Coulibaly, who had claimed allegiance to Islamic State, was killed after taking hostages at a Hyper Cacher supermarket in Porte de Vincennes, having already murdered four Jewish shoppers.
The coordinated endgame unfolded live on French television, with news helicopters hovering over both sieges as millions watched. At the printing works north of Paris, the Kouachi brothers had held a lone hostage overnight, a graphic designer named Lilian Lepère who hid inside a cardboard box before persuading the gunmen to let him leave; he provided crucial intelligence to the assault teams before the final raid.
At the Hyper Cacher supermarket, Coulibaly had barricaded himself with hostages amid shelves of kosher food just before the Sabbath. A Malian Muslim employee, Lassana Bathily, hid several customers in a walk-in freezer, switching off the light and lowering its temperature to avoid detection, then slipped out to guide police — an act that later earned him French citizenship and a Legion of Honour.
The three-day spasm of violence, beginning with the January 7 attack on Charlie Hebdo's newsroom, killed 17 victims plus the three attackers, and triggered a global 'Je Suis Charlie' movement defending free expression, alongside a fierce debate over the limits of satire and security failures in French counterterrorism.
Key people: Chérif Kouachi, Saïd Kouachi, Amedy Coulibaly, Lassana Bathily