Teenager burned alive in France: ex-boyfriend sentenced to 18 years in prison

The Assize Court of minors of the Oise sentenced to 18 years of imprisonment the ex-boyfriend of Shaïna, for the murder of this teenager, stabbed and burned alive at 15 years old in 2019 in Creil, north of Paris. The verdict was handed down late Friday night after a week of closed-door trials.

The Assize Court of minors of the Oise sentenced to 18 years of imprisonment the ex-boyfriend of Shaïna, for the murder of this teenager, stabbed and burned alive at 15 years old in 2019 in Creil, north of Paris. AP - Jean-Francois Badias

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What for? What for? ", reacted the accused, pale complexion, burgeoning beard and dark eyes, to the announcement of the verdict, before affirming once again his innocence. Eighteen years in prison, a sentence -pronounced in a heavy atmosphere- lower than the requisitions of the attorney general who had requested thirty years of criminal imprisonment for a crime, according to him, "premeditated at every stage". The lawyers of the young man, a high school student with no criminal record at the time of the facts, had pleaded acquittal.

According to the investigation, Shaïna, described by her mother as "funny and smiling", was probably pregnant with the accused at the time of her death. For the civil parties, it is the fear of disappointing her parents and the transgression of a religious prohibition around sexuality that would have motivated the gesture of the ex-boyfriend of the teenager. They assure that the expert psychiatrist pointed out the lack of empathy and narcissism of the young man. "He was ready to destroy everything to save his image," concluded the attorney general on Friday. A portrait denied by the defense.

"All gender-based violence"

Shaïna had been the victim in 2017 in his city of sexual assaults whose images had been broadcast. Four other youths were sentenced on 1 June on appeal to suspended prison sentences ranging from six months to two years.

In two years, the teenager "has experienced all the gender-based violence: rape requalified as sexual assault, physical and psychological violence, insults, acts of harassment", in the face of which justice has "not always been up to the task", pointed out after his pleading Friday Me Zoé Royaux, spokesperson for the Women's Foundation, civil party.

A friend of the accused said he could not remember seeing blood on his clothes the day after the incident. And two ex-co-detainees, according to whom the young man would have boasted of having killed so as not to endorse the paternity of a "bastard", did not appear.

In France, according to official figures, a woman dies every three days from the violence of her spouse or ex-spouse.

>> Read also: [Testimonials] Violence against women: "I let the first blows pass by telling myself that it was my fault"

(

with AFP)

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