Big fail for the cyber parquet. After an incredible hearing, this Thursday, August 31, the Paris court has just released Hamza Bendelladj, who was attending his trial by videoconference from his American prison. The reason ? As reported by ZDNET.fr last May, during its first hearing before French judges, the summons to appear of the famous Algerian hacker nicknamed BX1 wrongly mentioned JobCrypter ransomware.
A malware yet totally absent from the procedure. Either a very big legal problem, since this citation is the document which summarizes the defendant the charges with which he is accused. Hamza Bendelladj, sentenced in the United States in 2016 to fifteen years in prison for his involvement in the banking Trojan SpyEye, was accused of having hacked and attempted to extort during the summer of 2018 companies and banking organizations with the PyLocky ransomware.
Total relaxation
After a short deliberation, the three judges of the 13th correctional chamber finally pronounced a total release shortly after 10 p.m. “The robbery of a Leclerc is not that of a Carrefour”, summarize after the hearing the two lawyers of “BX1”, Me Raphaël Chiche and Jérémie Nataf. The prosecution, which can appeal, had admitted a “material error” on the name of the ransomware in the summons. While ensuring that this mention was “superfluous”, a way to minimize the impact of the blunder.
Hamza Bendelladj having refused to appear on a rectified summons, the court could have continued the trial. But it would then have been necessary to evacuate the offenses for which the use of JobCrypter was specifically cited, which would have transformed the procedure into a kind of Swiss cheese. How to judge a defendant for the deletion of data if the prosecution for piracy itself has just been dropped? Finally, for the lawyers of BX1, there was the risk of a severance of the proceedings infringing the rights of their client.
Theatrical thrust
The error in the citation had not escaped the defense. But Hamza Bendelladj’s lawyers mischievously made the pleasure last. The hearing, which began at 3 p.m., was suspended for the first time, the time for a private exchange between the black robes and their client. His lawyers then pleaded for a request for dismissal, filed two priority questions of constitutionality and finally raised nullities.
So many requests that came to nothing. Before the thrust is theatrically carried through BX1. As the president finally begins to address the substance of the case, Hamza Bendelladj draws her attention to this strange incongruity. Why does she mention in her report the TinyNuke loader or the PyLocky ransomware when the direct quote only talks about JobCrypter? We know the rest.