Man jailed after threatening to kill son's teacher in French village

A man has been given a six-month jail term in France after he threatened to kill a female primary school teacher who had disciplined his son at a village primary school.

He was sentenced after a fast-track hearing on Thursday, six days after the events unfolded in Le Fauga, a village with a population of about 2,600 just outside the southwestern city of Toulouse.

The teacher has been granted official protection and has gone on sick leave.

French Education Minister Edouard Geffray said: "No teacher should be afraid to do their job. Attacking one of them is attacking the entire institution."

Over the summer, Geffray steered through a law aimed at protecting staff from a "significant risk" to their safety or health from a member of a student's family.

The minister said this case would trigger one of the first uses of the decree.

The case revives terrible memories in France of the beheading of a teacher in the Paris suburb of Conflans-Sainte-Honorine six years ago. Samuel Paty was murdered outside his school by an 18-year-old Chechen refugee.

In Le Fauga, the teacher's colleagues did not go into work on Monday because of what had happened the previous Friday.