French Court’s New Analysis in the Case of Sarah Halimi’s Brutal Murder

July 15, 2018

Paris

On 28 February 2018, the investigating magistrate in the case of the 4 April 2017 savage murder of 65 year old doctor, Sarah Halimi, accepted an expert analysis that her murderer was fit to stand trial.

Moreover, Kobili Traoré’s action, in stabbing her and throwing her from her third floor balcony to her death, while screaming “Allahu Akhbar,” was acknowledged as, indeed “an act of anti-Semitic character.”

On 18 June, 2018, Dr. Shimon Samuels, SWC Director for International Relations wrote to French Interior Minister, Gerard Collomb, lamenting that “the current defence system is inadequate,” protesting an attack on a teenage female student by three North Africans outside her Jewish School... noting the withdrawal of the military presence guarding synagogues, Jewish schools and other institutions.

The letter had also stressed: “the revolving door” treatment of young Islamist attackers on Jews and Jewish property by magistrates.

By far the most serious, Samuels had emphasized the denial of the “anti-Semitic character” in terrorism against Jews, stating, “the courts’ reluctance to acknowledge the anti-Semitic nature of these attacks - ostensibly saving the perpetrator from an aggravated penalty - has the apparent effect of a ‘cover-up’ and an excuse for delay.”

On 11 July 2018, the investigative magistrate presented a second evaluation of three psychiatric experts, claiming that the murderer:

“Was not conscious at the moment of his actions,”and consequently cannot face a long and difficult trial... The subject was suffering, at that moment, a psychic or neuropsychic condition and was not in control of his actions... Traoré was suffering from a chronic psychiatric condition, probably schizophrenia... He also suffered from a long addiction to cannabis... a pathological anti-social personality (incapacity to conform to social norms, impulsiveness, irritability, aggressiveness, irresponsibility and propensity to violence)...unfit to stand trial.”

Samuels requested that the Minister discuss with his colleague, the Justice Minister, “a way to acknowledge ipso facto hate-crimes and atrocities on a fast track basis, as procedures excusing the violence on grounds of mental disorder add to serial and mimetic assault.”

The Judge has requested a third analysis for the Autumn, as justice is further delayed.

“If every psychotic has the right to commit violence against Jews with impunity, there are a lot more anti-Semites than we ever thought,” concluded Samuels.


For further information, contact Shimon Samuels at +33 609 770 158, join the Center on Facebook, www.facebook.com/simonwiesenthalcenter, or follow @simonwiesenthal for news updates sent direct to your Twitter feed.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center is one of the largest international Jewish human rights organizations with over 400,000 member families in the United States. It is an NGO at international agencies including the United Nations, UNESCO, the OSCE, the OAS, the Council of Europe and the Latin American Parliament (Parlatino).