The maximum sentence was called for on Monday against Algerian student Sid-Ahmed Ghlam, who was on trial for the murder of a young woman and a failed attack on a church in April 2015.
Sid-Ahmed Ghlam was a “man of exceptional dangerousness” who had a “deviant and paranoid” vision of his religion, the prosecution said in its closing argument before the Paris Court of Appeal on Monday.
The prosecution requested a life sentence combined with a 22-year security sentence and a permanent ban from entering French territory after the sentence expires. In the first instance, Sid-Ahmed Ghlam had been sentenced to exactly this penalty in 2020.
“His aim was to spread terror,” is the charge against him. During his appeal, Ghlam “perversely insisted on his lies”.”Nothing good can be expected from him in the future,” the Pnat representatives added. “He did not have the courage to answer for his deeds.
On several occasions, they compared the behaviour of Sid-Ahmed Ghlam with that of the victim’s daughter, who was four years old at the time of the crime. In a letter read out by her father, J., now 11 years old, wrote that she ” must accept her fate “.
Sid-Ahmed Ghlam was not capable of doing so, the prosecution said. “Lying is part of his way of life”.
In contrast to his trial at first instance, Sid-Ahmed Ghlam admitted travelling to Syria to meet with Islamic State leaders and acknowledged that he had intended to kill parishioners in a church in Villejuif before abandoning his plan. “But this confession is not a confession. We were already convinced” that the accused had travelled to Syria and also intended to carry out a murderous attack in a church, the prosecution said.
Initially, Ghlam admitted to meeting with Islamic State members, albeit in Turkey, and claimed that he only wanted to “scare” the parishioners of the church in Villejuif (Val-de-Marne) in April 2015.
On appeal, he further denied being responsible for the murder of Aurélie Chatelain, who was shot in cold blood in a car park in Villejuif in order to steal her car. As in the first case, Sid-Ahmed Ghlam claimed that a mysterious accomplice, of whom investigators have found no trace, killed the 32-year-old mother.
According to the prosecution, only Sid-Ahmed Ghlam’s blood and DNA were found at the crime scene.
After the murder, Mr Ghlam had accidentally injured his thigh when he put his gun back on his belt. This injury forced him to abandon his plan to carry out the attack on the church.
Sid-Ahmed Ghlam, 30, remained seated with his head down for most of the time during the reading of the indictment. “You are the only one who can redeem yourself,” urged the Chatelain family’s lawyer, Charles Merlen, before the closing argument – to no avail.
Antoine Casubolo-Ferro, another lawyer for the Chatelain family, condemned the ” scandalous and unscrupulous denials ” of the accused. “Why did Sid-Ahmed Ghlam not confess to the murder of Aurélie Chatelain during the trial”? “Because the truth is that he never left the ideology of the Islamic State”, the lawyer replied.
“You will not be convicted because you are a Muslim. You will be convicted because you are a murderer,” said Gérard Chemla, the last lawyer for the civil parties.
The two prosecutors from the National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office (Pnat) also requested prison sentences of 15, 25 and 30 years for Sid-Ahmed Ghlam’s three main codefendants.
These codefendants also include Rabah Boukaouma, described by the prosecution as the “chief logistician” of the operation and sentenced in the first instance to 30 years’ imprisonment with a two-thirds preventive detention.
While the prosecution confirmed its request for a two-thirds preventive detention for Farid Brahami, who was sentenced to 25 years in prison in the first instance, it did not want to determine a preventive detention for Abdelkader Jalal, who was sentenced to 15 years in prison with a two-thirds preventive detention in the first instance.
Jalal, who says he has relapsed several times, has repeatedly claimed he is “not a terrorist”. He has been in prison since April 2015 and greeted the statement of claim with relief, smiling at his lawyers.
The defence will begin its plea on Tuesday. The verdict is expected on Thursday or Friday.
His vision of islam wasn’t “deviant and paranoid” it was correct