It is the same penalty as at first instance.
The Paris Assize Court of Appeal sentenced on the night of Thursday to Friday a 46-year-old father to twenty years of criminal imprisonment for more than thirty rapes, attempted rapes and sexual assaults, in the forest from Sénart (Essonne).
At the end of more than fourteen hours of deliberation, the court imposed on Aïssa Zerouati the same sentence as at first instance, for having sexually assaulted between 1995 and 2000 more than thirty women in the vast forest located 25 km away. south-east of Paris.
The “rapist of the Sénart forest”, as the press called him, had sowed fear for five years among joggers and walkers.
Wearing a full-face motorcycle helmet that he never took off during the attacks, the man had been confused by DNA traces (blood and semen) found on half of his victims.
Father of a family without history
The recurrent modus operandi and the consistent testimonies of the complainants on the physical appearance of the aggressor had enabled the investigators to conclude that the offenses were serial.
A simple father, residing in Corbeil-Essonnes and living from low-skilled odd jobs, Aïssa Zerouati was indicted in 2015 for 34 acts of rape, attempted rape and aggravated sexual assault - some victims being pregnant or elderly and having were sometimes threatened with a weapon.
The Paris Assize Court of Appeal followed the requisitions of Advocate General Marc Mulet, who had asked for twenty years in prison, brandishing the “indisputable proof” of DNA.
However, she acquitted him for three of the 34 acts and did not add to this sentence a two-thirds security period as required by the public prosecutor's office, judging that Aïssa Zerouati "no longer presents a state of dangerousness ”requiring it, explained the president of the court Laurent Raviot.
A socio-judicial follow-up measure as well as an injunction of care were pronounced against him.
Justice