Presented as one of the biggest drug traffickers in France, Mohamed Djeha, known as "Mimo", who began his criminal rise in Marseille, was arrested Thursday, June 15 in Algeria after years of hunting.
"It's a very big catch because he is someone who can be considered the number 1 drug trafficking in Marseille, but he also organized the importation of narcotic products for other French regions," whether cannabis or cocaine, commented to AFP a source close to the file: "He is one of the biggest French traffickers" and was on the list of "targets of priority interest" of the French Anti-Narcotics Office ( Ofast).
The arrest was carried out by Algerian police on Thursday in Oran (northwestern Algeria), Marseille prosecutor Dominique Laurens and police sources told AFP, confirming information from the Journal du Dimanche.
French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin thanked the investigators for their work and "the Algerian authorities for their cooperation."
Dual French-Algerian nationality
"This arrest took place after the visit in May of Ofast (French Anti-Narcotics Office, editor's note) to Algeria, then the director general of the police and the central director of the judicial police in June, to discuss cooperation between the two countries and in particular the situation of Mr. Djeha," another source close to the case told AFP.
"The French judicial authorities have denounced the facts (for which he was convicted in France, editor's note) to Algeria so that he can be tried on the spot," added this source, rejecting a priori any possibility of extradition for this forty-year-old who has dual French-Algerian nationality.
Born on September 21, 1981 in Béjaïa (250 kilometers east of Algiers), Mohamed Djeha Idri, 41, nicknamed "Mimo" but also sometimes "Papipaolo" or "Suarez", had been the subject of an arrest warrant since 2019 after a sentence of 10 years in prison in a vast case of laundering drug trafficking in Marseille, in the city of La Castellane.
Chefs abroad
He was also sentenced in May this year, in his absence, to 30 years in prison by the Assize Court of Aix-en-Provence, found guilty of ordering a murder committed on the A55 motorway near Marseille in 2017.
Many neighborhoods in France's second city are plagued by drug trafficking - mostly cannabis - and wars over control of outlets are increasingly deadly. In 2022, about thirty people lost their lives in the settling of scores related to trafficking. Since the beginning of this year, 23 people have been killed, including a mother, who may be a collateral victim, on 10 May.
The victims are usually young men, sometimes teenagers, at the bottom of the trafficking ladder, with top bosses, such as Mohamed Djeha, hiding abroad, in the Middle East, the Maghreb or Spain.
"Since 2018 and the first trial, 'Mimo' no longer resided in France. We knew he was travelling between Dubai, Algeria and Morocco," a source close to the case told AFP. It was only recently that investigators were certain that he had settled in Algeria and that he was avoiding Dubai for fear of being arrested and handed over to French justice.
"Intelligence Unit"
In recent years, Ofast has made it a priority to track down major traffickers, often based abroad, thanks in particular to an "intelligence pole" of about thirty people, with some major successes.
In March 2021, another trafficker considered a drug lord on French territory, French-Algerian Moufide Bouchibi, was arrested in Dubai and then transferred to France. A few months later, a man suspected of piloting a major drug trafficking in Marseille, Hakim Berrebouh, was also arrested in Dubai and handed over to French justice.
More recently, Karim Harrat alias "Rantanplan", a Marseillais wanted for a series of organized homicides perpetrated between 2018 and 2020 in connection with drug trafficking and who had fled to Dubai and Morocco, was extradited to France.
With AFP
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