It was judged on appeal for the murder of Aurélie Châtelain and an aborted attack against a Church of Villejuif (Val-de-Marne) in April 2015.
Le Monde with AFP
The perpetual criminal imprisonment was confirmed, Thursday, October 28, against the Algerian student Sid Ahmed Ghlam, judged on appeal for the murder of a young woman and an aborted attack against a church of Villejuif (Val-de- Marne) in April 2015.
The 30-year-old student, “in stressors”, according to the President of the Special Assize Court, Emmanuelle Bessona, refused to appear at the hearing for the Statement of Judgment. He refused to get out of his cell from the courthouse to hear the verdict, obliging the Special Assize Court of Paris to send a bailiff notify him of his judgment.
“This demonstrates the cowardice of this individual who has eventually proved unable to face the family of Aurélie Chatelain,” commented Antoine Casubolo-Ferro, the murdered young woman’s lawyer.
The Court finally did not follow the requisitions of the general lawyers of the national anti-terrorist prosecutor’s office (UNAT), which had claimed the maximum penalty provided for by law. If Sid Ahmed Ghlam is condemned, as at first instance, to perpetuity, he is no longer subject to a twenty-two-year-old security sentence. On the other hand, its prohibition of the territory at the end of its imprisonment has been confirmed.
Afeux who do not convince
In their requisitions, the two general lawyers of the UNAT had recalled that Sid Ahmed Ghlam was a “man of extraordinary dangerous” with a “devouted and paranoid” vision of his religion. “His goal was to sowing terror,” they supported. During his appeal trial, Mr. Ghlam “persevered in his lies in a perverse way.” “There is nothing to expect from him, have added the representatives of the UNAT. He did not have the courage to assume his actions.”
“The lie is part of its operation” and “it feeds a real hatred for the West,” they still said. Unlike his trial at first instance, Mr. Ghlam has recognized this time to have gone to Syria to meet the executives of the Islamic State Organization (EI). He also admitted that he had intended to kill parishioners in a church of Villejuif before giving up his project.
“But these confessions are not. We were already convinced” that the accused had gone to Syria and that he wanted to commit a deadly attack in a church, said the general lawyers. In first instance, Mr. Ghlam recognized having met EI executives, but in Turkey, and he argued that it was just “to scare” to parishioners.
In appeal, he persisted in denying being the author of the assassination of Aurélie Châtelain, coldly slaughtered on a parking lot of Villejuif to steal his car. As at first instance, Mr. Ghlam argued that a mysterious complicit, whose investigators found no trace, had killed the young mother of 32 years old.
Only the blood and DNA of Mr. Ghlam were found on the crime scene, recalled the general lawyers. After the assassination, he had accidentally injured himself in the thigh by putting his weapon back to the belt. This injury had forced him to give up his attack project.