“He was a bastard, he trapped me”: at trial of Nice attack, first words of accused

The seven accused who appear made a prior declaration on Tuesday on the second day of the trial. We should then no longer hear them until their interrogations on the substance, in November.

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The trial of the July 14, 2016 attack in Nice is planned to last fifteen weeks, with a verdict expected on December 16. As with the trial of the attacks of November 13, 2015, a large part of the debates will be devoted to the testimonies of the civil parties which must spread over five weeks, a third of the hearing, between the end of September and the end of October. As at the trial of November 13, when the first months of debate had left the strange impression of a trial without accused, the latter will only be heard on the merits from the ninth week of hearing in early November.

The traditional prior declaration of the accused, Tuesday, September 6, on the second day of the trial, was therefore an opportunity for each of the seven who appear (one eighth, on the run, is judged in his absence), to make their Voice and to position themselves in relation to the facts, before taking refuge in silence for almost a month and a half. Before giving them the floor, the president of the Paris Special Assize Court, Laurent Raviot, admitted that this first part of the trial “leaves them a little aside”, but assured that “the court will take the time for Examine their personality, the charges chosen against them and their defense elements “.

The three close to the killer

The three relatives of the terrorist, all of Tunisian origin, are the only ones, among the eight accused, to be prosecuted for “association of terrorist criminal”, a crime liable to twenty years’ imprisonment at the time of the facts. Two of them appear detained – the only ones to be in the context of this file – the third being free under judicial supervision. None are prosecuted for “complicity of assassinations”, the investigating judges believing that, if they were able to help the terrorist, it is not established that they were aware of the attack project or that they are themselves radicalized.

Mohamed Ghraieb, 46, a naturalized French Tunisian, is the only one in this trio to appear free. Married to a Protestant Finnish, he was a receptionist in a hotel in Nice at the time of the facts. Shaved close, ras, he is one of the only ones to express himself in a correct French and was, by far, the largest at the helm. And for good reason: proclaiming his innocence, he claims to have been “trapped” by the terrorist, who left many clues behind him to incriminate him. Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel had taken him in particular in the truck he had just rented, only a few days before the attack.