The Algiers Court of Appeal on Monday sentenced 38 people to the death penalty for the lynching to death of a man mistaken for an arsonist after helping to put out deadly fires in 2021, according to the official APS agency. These sentences will be commuted to life imprisonment because a moratorium on the application of the death penalty has been in force since 1993. The lynching, which took place during the summer of 2021 in the Kabylie region (north-west), had raised a wave of indignation throughout the country.
Of the 94 people tried in this case, in addition to the 38 death sentences, the Court acquitted 27 people and sentenced the others to sentences ranging from three to 20 years in prison, according to the APS.
A painter beaten and then burned alive
Those sentenced to death were notably found guilty of “terrorist and subversive acts having undermined the security of the State, national unity and the stability of institutions; of participation in intentional homicide with premeditation ; of conspiracy”. At first instance, in November 2022, 49 people were sentenced to the death penalty, seven were acquitted and the others received sentences of between two and 10 years in prison.
In less than a week in August 2021, fires had killed at least 90 people in Kabylia and ravaged thousands of hectares. After hearing that he was suspected of having started a fire, a 38-year-old painter, Djamel Bensmaïl, who had come to help the villagers put out the flames, voluntarily presented himself to the police to provide explanations for his presence on places. Images relayed by social networks showed a crowd surrounding the police van and extracting the young man from the vehicle. Djamel Bensmaïl had been beaten and then burned alive, and young people had taken selfies in front of his corpse.
The images of the lynching then went viral, commented on in particular via the hashtag #JusticePourDjamelBenIsmail. The perpetrators of the selfies tried to cover their tracks but Internet users across the country compiled videos and took screenshots so that the crime did not go unpunished.