The Paris Assize Court sentenced, this Saturday January 29, two Egyptians, Mahmoud Kadri and Karim Ibrahim, to 22 years of criminal imprisonment for the murder in 2018 in the Bois de Boulogne of Vanesa Campos, an undocumented transgender sex worker .
The sentences pronounced after more than nine hours of deliberation go beyond the requisitions of the prosecution, which had requested, Thursday, January 27, 20 years of imprisonment against Mahmoud Kadri and 15 years against Karim Ibrahim.
The court found the two main defendants guilty of “murder in an organized gang”, a crime which they have always disputed and for which they refer responsibility. Advocate General Olivier Auféril had requested for Karim Ibrahim a requalification as “complicity” in murder.
Located at the opposite extreme in the box, Mahmoud Kadri, 24, and Karim Ibrahim, 29, seemed to take the hit when the verdict was announced, then remaining seated for long minutes. During the proceedings, they admitted to having been part of a band of thieves who robbed the clients of South American trans prostitutes and to having wanted on the evening of the facts to “fight” with the protectors they had hired to defend themselves from their actions.
Six other convictions
In their final words on Saturday morning before the court retired to deliberate, they both said they were “sorry” about what happened on the night of August 16-17, 2018. The court also sentenced six other accused aged 23 to 34, tried alongside them since January 11.
One of them, who was also being prosecuted for murder, was sentenced to six years’ imprisonment for intentional violence resulting in death without intention of causing it.
Four other men were sentenced to terms ranging from three years in prison, two of which were suspended, to six years in prison for their participation in the punitive expedition during which Vanesa Campos was killed.
An eighth man was sentenced – in accordance with the requisitions of the Advocate General – to a five-year prison sentence for having participated in the theft of the murder weapon, a pistol stolen from a police officer a week before the facts.
“regain control of the territory”
Vanesa Campos, a 36-year-old Peruvian prostitute, was killed near her workplace, in one of the most remote places in the Bois de Boulogne, devoid of public lighting, after finding herself facing a group of at least a dozen young men.
For the prosecution, they met there to “regain control of the territory”, armed in particular with a pistol, a truncheon, knives, tear gas canisters and tree branches found on the spot.