(Paris) French rapper MHD was sentenced on Saturday to 12 years in prison by the Paris Assize Court, where he appeared with eight co-defendants for the murder of a young man in 2018, as part of a settlement of accounts between rival gangs.
Five of his co-defendants were also sentenced to sentences ranging from 10 to 18 years in prison.
Three other men were acquitted, the court considering that one of them was not on the scene at the time of the crime, and that for the other two, it did not have sufficient evidence to condemn them.
The prosecution had requested 18 years of criminal imprisonment against the artist, whose real name is Mohamed Sylla, 13 to 20 years in prison against six other defendants, and two acquittals.
When the verdict was announced, several women in the audience, relatives of the accused, burst into tears. MHD, for his part, remained stoic, before hugging a crying woman. He was then arrested and taken to prison.
His lawyers declined to make a statement after the verdict.
“Heavy hearing, but a judicial truth emerged despite the law of silence”, for his part reacted Me Juliette Chapelle, lawyer for the family of the victim, Loïc K.
Those convicted have 10 days to appeal.
Saturday morning, the rapper proclaimed his innocence one last time, in front of a packed house, before the court retired to deliberate.
On the night of July 5 to 6, 2018, Loïc K., a young man aged 23, was deliberately knocked down by a Mercedes in thee district of Paris, then beaten by around ten men and slashed with knives. He died, lying in his blood, a few dozen minutes after his attackers left.
The car was found the next day, set on fire, in a parking lot.
At the heart of the matter, a settling of scores between young people from two neighboring cities located in the north-east of the capital.
This affair clearly slowed down the career of the artist, pioneer of “afro-trap”, a mixture of hip-hop and African music, revealed in 2015 thanks to a video published on YouTube which went viral, the starting point of a meteoric rise.
PHOTO THOMAS SAMSON, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE ARCHIVES
MHD at the Victoires de la Musique, in 2017
From a pizza deliveryman, in a few months he became a recognized star not only in France but also abroad, where he was noticed by artists like Madonna and Drake.
A fairy tale put on hold by his arrest and his placement in pre-trial detention – he will remain incarcerated for a year and a half before being released under judicial supervision.
“Law of silence” and “rumor”
The rapper, who despite his success continued to frequent the city in which he lived between two tours, was implicated by several witnesses who affirmed that he was at the scene of the crime, which he contested from the start .
Investigators also establish that the Mercedes set on fire belonged to him and one of the videos of the scene, taken from an apartment, shows an African man with dyed blond hair, wearing a Puma tracksuit.
However, at that time, MHD had peroxided hair and was an ambassador for the sportswear brand.
On Friday, his lawyers pleaded for acquittal for their client, as had the lawyers of the other accused before them.
This case was illustrated, throughout the investigation and then the three weeks of trial, by the “law of silence” to which the accused, but also numerous witnesses, submitted. A large number of them, although summoned, did not appear in court. A law of silence dictated by the “fear of reprisals”, according to several people.
In their pleadings on Thursday and Friday, the defense lawyers attacked the way the investigations were carried out, criticizing a case “built on a rumor” and relying on “lame” elements and missing testimonies according to them of objectivity.