The Paris Special Assize Court on Tuesday handed down sentences ranging from 2 to 18 years in prison for the eight people tried in the trial of the Nice attack, where a Tunisian driving a ram truck had killed 86 people. July 14, 2016.
The assailant, Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, a 31-year-old delivery driver, was shot dead by the police after his murderous run on the Promenade des Anglais, where the crowd had gathered for the national holiday.
His act had been claimed by the Islamic State group, but no link could be demonstrated between the jihadist movement and him.
The heaviest sentences of eighteen years of criminal imprisonment, beyond the indictment of the National Anti-Terrorist Prosecutor’s Office (PNAT), were pronounced against Chokri Chafroud and Mohamed Ghraieb, convicted of association of terrorist criminals (AMT).
The PNAT had requested 15 years of imprisonment against them.
“The court had the intimate conviction that the “perpetrator of the attack” Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel had been associated, in the determination and then the realization of his criminal project, with both Mohamed Ghraieb and Chokri Chafroud”, indicated the president of the court Laurent Raviot, at the end of the reading of the verdict.
Mohamed Ghraieb and Chokri Chafroud faced 20 years in prison.
The third defendant who appeared for AMT, Ramzi Arefa, was sentenced to 12 years’ imprisonment for criminal association, without terrorist qualification, and arms trafficking.
He was the only one to face life imprisonment because he was in a situation of legal recidivism due to a one-year prison sentence for theft in 2014.
The PNAT had also requested the abandonment of the terrorist qualification against him, but claimed 15 years of imprisonment.
“Obvious terrorist inspiration”
Ramzi Arefa, a 28-year-old from Nice, had admitted having provided a semi-automatic pistol to the killer, who had used it on the evening of the attack without however injuring anyone.
The court underlined the “seriousness” of this transaction, but recognized that there were “no elements allowing to determine that he could have had an idea of the jihadist determination of Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel”, their relationship being recent .
In its verdict, the court found that the driver’s act had “an obvious terrorist inspiration”, even if no allegiance or link with a terrorist organization could be demonstrated.
Often sparse since the start of the proceedings on September 5, the “major trials” courtroom of the Paris Courthouse was crowded for the first time on Tuesday. Several civil parties wore a t-shirt on which appeared a heart made up of the names of the victims.
Applause rang out after the announcement of the sentence imposed on Chokri Chafroud, before the reframing of President Raviot. “No demonstrations please, we are in a courtroom, it is not admissible. Justice needs serenity,” he stressed.
More than 2,500 civil parties have joined the trial.
The other five defendants were found guilty of arms trafficking or criminal association, without terrorist qualification, and sentenced to terms ranging from two to eight years in prison.
The PNAT had requested from 2 to 10 years against them.
During their pleadings, the defense lawyers called on the court to distinguish between “the suffering of the victims” and the real “involvement” of the defendants.
Adélaïde Jacquin had thus said she “trusted” the court to “take a step back from the extraordinarily serious nature of the facts” of July 14, 2016.