(Paris) French rapper MHD was sentenced to 12 years in prison on Saturday by the Paris assize court, where he appeared alongside eight co-defendants for the 2018 murder of a young man as part of a reckoning between rival gangs.
Published yesterday at 1:33 p.m.
Eleonore DERMY Agence France-Presse
Five of his co-defendants were also sentenced to prison terms of between 10 and 18 years.
Three other men were acquitted because the court assumed that one of them was not at the crime scene at the time of the crime and that there was insufficient evidence to convict the other two.
The public prosecutor’s office had requested 18 years in prison against the artist, whose real name is Mohamed Sylla, and 13 to 20 years in prison and two acquittals against six other defendants.
When the verdict was announced, several women in the audience, relatives of the defendants, 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 comment after the verdict.
“A heated hearing, but despite the law of silence, a judicial truth came to light,” reacted Me Juliette Chapelle, lawyer for the family of the victim, Loïc K.
Those convicted have ten days to file an appeal.
On Saturday morning, the rapper protested his innocence one last time in front of a packed house before the court withdrew to deliberate.
On the night of July 5th to 6th, 2018, Loïc K., a young man aged 23, was deliberately hit by a Mercedes in the 10th arrondissement of Paris, then beaten and stabbed by around ten men. He died lying in his blood a few dozen minutes after his attackers left.
The car was found set on fire in a parking lot the next day.
Essentially, it’s about a dispute between young people from two neighboring towns in the northeast of the capital.
This affair significantly slowed down the career of the artist, pioneer of “Afro-Trap”, a mix of hip-hop and African music, which became known in 2015 thanks to a video published on YouTube that went viral and was the starting point of a meteoric rise was.
PHOTO THOMAS SAMSON, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE ARCHIVE
MHD at the Victoires de la Musique in 2017
From a pizza delivery man, within a few months he became a recognized star not only in France but also abroad, where artists like Madonna and Drake noticed him.
A fairy tale that has been put on hold by his arrest and detention in custody – he will remain in prison 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 frequently visit the city where he lived between two tours, was accused by several witnesses who confirmed that he was at the crime scene, something he denied from the start.
Investigators also determined that the Mercedes that was set on fire belonged to him, and one of the crime scene videos taken from an apartment shows an African man with dyed blonde hair wearing a Puma tracksuit.
However, MHD had peroxidized hair at the time and was an ambassador for the sportswear brand.
On Friday, his lawyers argued for acquittal on behalf of their client, as did the lawyers for the other defendants before them.
This case was illustrated throughout the investigation and then during the three-week trial by the “law of silence” to which the defendants but also numerous witnesses submitted. Many of them did not appear in court despite being summoned. A law of silence that, according to several people, was dictated by “fear of reprisals.”
In their arguments on Thursday and Friday, the defense lawyers attacked the way the investigation was conducted, criticized a case that was “built on a rumor” and relied on “lame” elements and a lack of objective witness statements.