The court, the defendants, the civil parties, the lawyers… Here are the main protagonists of this historic trial which opens in Paris this Wednesday, September 8 at the courthouse on the Île de la Cité.
The trial opens this Wednesday before the special assize court in Paris. Twenty people will be tried there. Fourteen of them will take place in the dock. Eleven are detained, three will appear free and the other six, including five presumed dead, will be tried in absentia.
Twenty defendants
Salah Abdeslam
Born September 15, 1989 in Brussels, the Franco-Moroccan Salah Abdeslam, 31, is the only survivor of the November 13 commandos. Salah Abdeslam is a former petty criminal and party animal, who later became a jihadist. A member of the “terraces” team, his older brother Brahim died when he blew himself up at the Comptoir Voltaire. Salah Abdeslam abandoned his explosive belt in the evening for reasons that are still unknown.
Will he speak in front of the court and the victims of the attacks? This question is the great unknown of this trial. He almost systematically remained silent in front of the judges or during his trial in Brussels in 2018, where he was sentenced to twenty years in prison for shooting at police a few days before his arrest in Belgium on March 18, 2016.
Salah Abdeslam is yet to be tried in Belgium – probably at the end of 2022 – for the double attack which killed 32 people in March 2016 at the airport and in a Brussels metro. He was close to Abdelhamid Abaaoud (one of his childhood friends), coordinator of several attacks in Europe and operational chief of the November 13 commandos.
Mohamed Abrini, “the man with the hat”
Born on December 27, 1984, this 36-year-old Belgian-Moroccan is on trial for having accompanied the November 13 commandos in the Paris region and participated in their financing and the supply of their weapons. This childhood friend of the Abdeslam brothers was arrested in Brussels in April 2016. He has been detained in Belgium since that date and was transferred to France for the trial.
He must also be tried in Belgium for the double suicide bombing of March 2016 in Brussels. CCTV footage of Zaventem airport with two of the suicide bombers who blew themselves up there earned him the nickname “the man with the hat”.
Mohammed Amri
Born on August 7, 1988, Mohammed Amri, 33, a Belgian-Moroccan close to the Abdeslam brothers, admitted to having gone to pick up Salah Abdeslam by car the evening of the attacks to bring him back to Belgium, knowing that he was involved in the attacks. . Arrested in Belgium on November 14, he was extradited in July 2016 to France, where he has been imprisoned since that date.
Hamza Attou
Born on May 4, 1994, Hamza Attou, a 27-year-old Belgian-Moroccan, was arrested in Belgium the day after the Paris attacks. He had accompanied Mohammed Amri to fetch Salah Abdeslam from Paris. Returned to France in June 2016, he was imprisoned before being released under judicial supervision in May 2018.
Yassine Atar
Born on July 11, 1986, this 35-year-old Belgian-Moroccan is suspected of having held a key to the Brussels hideout where Salah Abdeslam took refuge after the attacks. It is also in this hideout that the explosive belts used in Paris were manufactured. Arrested in Brussels in March 2016, he was extradited in June 2018 to France, where he is imprisoned. He is the younger brother of Osama Atar, a man whom investigators consider to be one of the coordinators of the Paris and Brussels attacks from Syria.
Sofien Ayari
Tunisian born on August 9, 1993, Sofien Ayari, 28, was Salah Abdeslam’s companion in Belgium. Having joined the Islamic State group in Syria at the end of 2014, he returned to Europe in 2015. Arrested in Brussels at the same time as Salah Abdeslam in March 2016, he has already been sentenced to twenty years’ imprisonment in Belgium for having shot on a policeman. His DNA was found in several hideouts used in the preparation of the November 13 attacks.
Osama Krayem
Of Swedish nationality, Osama Krayem, 29, born on August 16, 1992, joined Syria in 2014 and then returned to Europe by the migrant route. Like Sofien Ayari, he was Salah Abdeslam’s companion on the run in Brussels after the November 13 attacks.
Mohamed Bakkali
Considered one of the commando’s logisticians, Mohamed Bakkali is accused of having rented cars for the attacks. Detained in France since 2018, this 34-year-old Belgian-Moroccan, born on April 10, 1987, is also being prosecuted for the rental, under a false identity, of hideouts for the jihadist cell in Brussels.
Ali El Haddad Asufi
This Belgian-Moroccan, 36, born September 23, 1984 was in regular contact with members of the Franco-Belgian jihadist cell. He is accused of having participated in the supply of weapons. He has been in detention since June 2019.
Adel Haddadi et Muhammad Usman
Adel Haddadi, 34, an Algerian born July 17, 1987, and Muhammad Usman, 28, a Pakistani born May 15, 1993, were arrested in December 2015, a month after the attacks, in a migrant home in Austria. The two men left Syria and joined Europe by the migrant route with two suicide bombers from the Stade de France. They are suspected of having wanted to commit an attack in France. They have been detained in France since June 2016.
Farid Kharkhach
Belgian-Moroccan, 39, born July 4, 1982, Farid Kharkhach is accused of having provided false papers to the cell at the request of Khalid El Bakraoui, one of the perpetrators of the Brussels attacks. Arrested in Belgium in January 2017, he has been detained in France since June 2017.
Ali Oulkadi
Close to Brahim Abdeslam, this 37-year-old Frenchman, born on July 9, 1984, is suspected of having helped Salah Abdeslam to hide when he arrived in Brussels on November 14, but has always denied having been aware of the terrorist project of the cell. Arrested in Belgium on November 22, 2015 and handed over to France in April 2016, he was imprisoned before being released under judicial supervision in June 2018.
Abdellah Chouaa
This 40-year-old Belgian-Moroccan, born on March 30, 1981, is suspected of having provided logistical support to the cell that prepared the attacks. The son of an imam from the Brussels district of Molenbeek, he was released under judicial control.
►The defendants tried in their absence
Oussama Atar
Born May 4, 1984, Osama Atar is a jihad veteran identified by the war name “Abu Ahmed al-Iraki”. He is considered to be one of the leaders of the intelligence branch of the Islamic State (IS) group. According to the French magistrates, this Belgian-Moroccan is the organizer of the Parisian attacks. Never arrested, he was reportedly killed by a Western strike in the Iraqi-Syrian zone in November 2017.
Ahmad Alkhald
Ahmad Alkhald, the pseudonym behind which hides the Syrian Omar Darif (whose date and place of birth remain unknown), is considered the only major player in the November 13 commandos still at large. His DNA was found on explosive belts used in Paris. For investigators, he was one of the main artificers of the IS.
Fabien and Jean-Michel Clain
Figures of the French “jihad”, these two brothers from Toulouse were killed in February or March 2019 in an airstrike in Syria. Fabien Clain has been identified as the man who recorded the audio message claiming responsibility for the November 13 attacks and in which his brother Jean-Michel chanted religious songs.
Ahmed Dahmani
This Belgian-Moroccan, 32, born April 13, 1989 and from Molenbeek like his friend Salah Abdeslam, is suspected of being a logistician for the jihadist cell that prepared the attacks. This radicalized petty criminal fled on November 14, 2015 to Turkey, where he was sentenced in 2016 to ten years in prison and imprisoned. He is still imprisoned there.
Obeida Aref Dibo
Said Abou Walid Al-Souri, this Syrian was a member of the external operations cell of the IS, close to Ahmad Alkhad. Cousin of men involved in the escape of Ahmed Dahmani, he died in a bombardment in February 2016.
Twelve of the twenty defendants face life imprisonment. Three defendants, against whom weigh the least heavy charges, will appear free under judicial control.
The courtyard
The special assize court is presided over by Jean-Louis Périès. This will be his last trial before retirement. A challenge for this 65-year-old magistrate. Jean-Louis Périès has been preparing for it for almost a year and a half. The file is titanic with more than 500 volumes and 1800 civil parties. He will have to hold the proceedings for nearly nine months, an unprecedented length of time for criminal proceedings.
He will be surrounded by the first assessor Frédérique Aline and the honorary magistrate Xaviere Simeoni. Four additional magistrates will attend the proceedings and will replace the members of the court in the event of default.
The floor
Three attorneys general represent the prosecution, Camille Hennetier, Nicolas Le Bris and Nicolas Braconnay. They come from the National Anti-Terrorist Prosecutor’s Office (Pnat).
The civil parties and their lawyers
A total of 330 lawyers will come to plead. Those of the 1,800 civil parties, the survivors, the victims, the associations of victims of attacks such as Life for Paris or Fenvac and those of the defence.
Olivia Ronen knows that when the hearing opens, all eyes will be on her client: Salah Abdeslam. Profile far removed from the media tenor of the Lille bar Frank Berton, a time Salah Abdeslam’s lawyer, Olivia Ronen was officially appointed last November.
She was sworn in in 2016 and was elected secretary of the conference – these young lawyers from the Paris Bar elected for one year after an eloquence contest to, in particular, be appointed to the files of sitting. She called on a colleague of her generation to help defend Salah Abdeslam: Martin Vettes.
The civil parties are 1800 in number but this number may still change in the next two days.
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