Pulling pranks on strangers is practically a rite of passage, a collective childhood memory of harmless mischief that usually ends in a shared laugh. But along the picturesque banks of Paris’ Canal Saint-Martin, one teenager has weaponized a plastic toy, crossing the line from youthful play into a full-blown public nuisance—and the local police are entirely out of patience.
For several weeks, a 14-year-old boy has been running a highly illegal, water-soaked extortion racket targeting unsuspecting tourists and local motorists. Adopting the online persona “Hamza La Douane”—or “Customs Officer Hamza”—the teenager has transformed the trendy Parisian waterfront into his own personal border checkpoint.
His operation is as bold as it is disruptive. Armed with a high-powered water gun, Hamza flags down passing drivers and pedestrians, demanding a €2 “tax” (about $2.29) to grant them safe passage.
The ultimatum he blasted out to his social media followers leaves very little room for negotiation.
“You give me two euros, I won’t get you wet; you don’t give me two euros, I’ll light you up.”
Inspired by International Corruption
According to French newspaper Le Parisien, this bizarre shakedown wasn’t entirely original. The teenager openly admitted that his business model was directly inspired by real-world border corruption he witnessed abroad.
“In Algeria… when you pay the customs officers, they don’t search you… you can go on. I’ve got the same idea,” Hamza explained with surprising indifference.
But what the 14-year-old views as entrepreneurial satire, French authorities view as a escalating criminal record. Over the past year, Hamza has been linked to roughly 10 distinct offenses and has become intimately familiar to local law enforcement. In a testament to his escalating behavior, the teenager managed the rare feat of being arrested twice in a single week.
The allegations against him go far beyond a harmless squirt of water. Local reports indicate he has been caught on camera shoving women directly into the murky canal waters and aggressively blasting passers-by. According to Le Figaro, his growing rap sheet now features heavy-hitting charges including:
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Group violence and public vandalism
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Aggravated theft
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Insulting police officers
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Resisting arrest
“I Make People Laugh”
Despite the handcuffs and the looming judicial consequences, the teenage instigator remains entirely unfazed by the chaos trailing in his wake.
“I make people laugh, even mums come and take their photos with me,” he boasted during a televised interview with BFM TV, dismissing the idea that his actions are genuinely harmful.
Perhaps the most startling dynamic of Hamza’s operation is the domestic front. While the boy notes that his mother remains entirely oblivious to his alter ego, his father is not only aware of the canal shakedowns—he actively sanctions them.
“He leaves me alone because he knows I’m not doing anything bad,” Hamza said of his father. “All I do is water people and the police from time to time.”
Speaking with Le Parisien, the father aggressively defended the teenager’s behavior, painting a picture of an innocent boy misunderstood by the state. He insisted his son is fundamentally “a nice boy” who “doesn’t hurt anyone.”
As Paris prepares for another influx of seasonal tourists, the local precinct is moving forward with a prosecution designed to dismantle Canal Saint-Martin’s most notorious fake checkpoint. For Hamza, the game of playing customs officer is rapidly colliding with the very real, unyielding machinery of French justice.