The special ize court of Paris judging on appeal was once again more lenient than the prosecution, confirming, Friday, May 26, the judgment of first instance, which sentenced to fourteen years of imprisonment accompanied by a period of two-thirds security, the “repentant” Kevin Guiavarch, French pioneer of jihadism.
His wife Salma O., who appeared free, was sentenced to six years’ imprisonment, also as in the first instance, which she will be able to accomplish at home under an electronic bracelet because of her “reintegration efforts”. His sentence is accompanied by a socio-judicial follow-up measure of six years. These sentences, confirmed by the Court of Appeal, were deemed insufficient by the National Anti-Terrorist Prosecutor’s Office, which had appealed for their duration to be reviewed.
During his requisitions on Friday, the Advocate General had requested eighteen years’ imprisonment, with a two-thirds security period against Kevin Guiavarch (as during the trial at first instance) and twelve years’ imprisonment against his wife (against fourteen years during the trial at first instance) with a socio-judicial follow-up of five years.
“The guilt of the accused is no longer in debate today”recalled the Advocate General. “Society needs time” For “to trust” to the defendants, he explained before conceding that the two defendants were not part of the “elite soldiers” of the Islamic State (IS) organization and that they had not participated in abuses attributed to the jihadist organization.
Among the first French in Syria
Kevin Guiavarch is not “neither a fanatic nor an enlightened one”, acknowledged the Advocate General. But, he insisted, “it is the sentence that marks the seriousness of the acts committed”. “We must not minimize” the role of Salma O., he also underlined, while welcoming the ” connections “ that she was able to reconnect with her children (born during the couple’s stay in Syria) and her ” activity retake “ professional.
“Give me back the chance you gave me by allowing me to get back to work and my job as a mother”, Salma O. had asked the court before the latter retired to deliberate. In delivering its verdict, the Special ize Court of Appeal hailed Salma O.’s efforts to reintegrate into society.
Kevin Guiavarch, 30, and Salma O., 41, were among the first French people to join Syria in early 2013, even before the official birth of IS. Having pledged allegiance to the jihadist organization in June 2013, Kevin Guiavarch claimed to have been only “stretcher-bearer” Or ” male nurse “admitting to having participated only in checkpoint surveillance, even though he posted photos on Facebook of him (and Salma O.) in fatigues and arms, martyrs’ headband on his forehead.
Once there, he had brought three young women from France, some with their children, to marry them. “Polygamy permitted by Islam” was one of the reasons for his engagement, he acknowledged. He had left Syria with his extended family and their six children in June 2016, a departure which, for the Advocate General, was not “not an awareness of what was [l’EI] » but fell under “opportunism” as the organization suffered setbacks on the pitch.
Arrested in Turkey in 2016 and then handed over to the French authorities in January 2017, Kevin Guiavarch has since been imprisoned in France.
The World with AFP