Gang boss jailed for torturing French Jew to death

By Thierry Leveque in Paris

Reuters

July 11, 2009 10:21am

Youssouf Fofana jailed for Ilan Halimi's death
Life in jail ... Youssouf Fofana was found guilty of the kidnap and torture of a young Jewish man in France / AFP

    * Gang boss jailed for torture
    * Victim was young Jewish man
    * Anti-Semitism on rise in France

THE leader of a group that called itself a "gang of barbarians" was sentenced to life imprisonment by a French court for kidnapping and torturing a young Jewish man for more than three weeks before leaving him to die.

The gang abducted 23-year-old Ilan Halimi in 2006, unsuccessfully tried to extort a ransom for their captive, tortured him until he was close to death and then left him near a train station. He died shortly after he was found.

The case shocked France and turned a spotlight on anti-Semitic violence in the poor, multi-ethnic suburbs around many big French cities.

Amid tight courtroom security, Youssouf Fofana, the gang's leader, who admitted killing Mr Halimi, was sentenced to life imprisonment, the maximum penalty under French law, with a minimum period in jail of 22 years.

Twenty-four other gang members were handed sentences ranging from six months suspended to 18 years in prison. Two were acquitted.
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"I am pleased that the Paris court of assizes has recognised the anti-Semitic character of this crime," Francis Szpiner, a lawyer for Halimi's family said outside the courtroom.

"It was because he was Jewish that Ilan Halimi was killed and tortured. No one can challenge this judicial truth."

However he added that he was disappointed at what he said were lenient sentences handed to some of Fofana's accomplices and asked the Justice Ministry to seek an appeal.

Aside from the horrific details of the murder itself, the case attracted wide attention because of what it seemed to suggest about racial tensions and anti-Semitism in France. Many in the Jewish community say that anti-Semitic aggression among French youths of Arab and African origin has been on the rise in recent years, exacerbated by anger over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

According to several members of the gang, Mr Halimi was targeted because he was Jewish and was therefore believed to have money.

The trial, which lasted for more than two months, was held largely behind closed doors after clashes at the start of the hearing between radical Jewish militants and witnesses and relatives of some of the accused.

Fofana, a 28 year-old of Ivoirian origin, expressed no remorse and expressed defiance throughout the trial. On various occasions, he smirked at Hamili's relatives, shouted "Allahu Akbar!" ("God is greatest!) and at one point threw shoes at lawyers.

He gave his date of birth as February 13, 2006, in Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois, the date and place of Mr Halimi's death and bombarded the magistrates investigating the case with letters full of anti-Semitic insults.

Among the 26 other defendants were young men accused of taking part in the abduction and guarding of the captive, and a girl who is alleged to have lured Mr Halimi into the Paris suburb of Sceaux where he was kidnapped.


http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25764432-401,00.html

Notice that the dhimmi press doesn't dare say the *real* reason for the attack, Islam. I don't think there is any mention of the word there, they just vaguely refer to persons of Arab origin. Were these Christian Arabs? Hell no - they were muslim Arabs.

By the way, can you imagine the protests and riots worldwide, if a group of Jews captured a muslim civilian in France and tortured him to death?

"Muslim Jailed for Torturing Jew to Death"

Whether it is Jews in France,
or Christians in Turkey,
...moslems sincerely believe that they are 'justified' by ISLAM, in their Jihad [violence] against non-moslems.

Slain evangelists were tortured, says Turkish doctor
April 20, 2007
MALATYA, Turkey --  Three Protestants murdered at a Christian publishing house in Malatya, Turkey, were tortured for three hours before their assailants slit their throats, a press report said Friday, quoting one of the doctors involved in the grisly case.
Dr. Murat Ugras, a spokesman for the Turgut Ozal Medical center, told the daily Hurriyet of hospital surgeons' fruitless efforts to save Ugur Yuksel, one of the three victims of the massacre at the Zirve (summit) publishing house, which distributed Christian literature.
"He had scores of knife cuts on his thighs, his testicles, his rectum, and his back," Ugras said. "His fingers were sliced to the bone.
"It is obvious that these wounds had been inflicted to torture him," he said.
The two others who were killed, Necati Aydin, pastor of Malatya's tiny Protestant community, and German Tilmann Geske, a Malatya resident with his wife and three children since 2003, were also tortured, press reports said.
........Gunaydin, 19, had reportedly made several visits beforehand to the publishing house to gain the confidence of the people working there, newspapers said.
The daily Radikal said that the German was the first to die and the two Turks were slaughtered only when police arrived at the door after receiving a call from a member of the Protestant community who grew suspicious when he found the office door locked.

http://www.metimes.com/storyview.php?StoryID=20070420-064724-9427r  [dead link?]

Google,
"Slain evangelists were tortured, says Turkish doctor"
http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&q=%22Slain+evangelists+were+tortured%2C+sa...





Cop this next

LEGAL ARGUMENT

, made in a Turkish [secular] court....

20 Dec 2005
Jihad is 'Muslim obligation'
A lawyer defending al Qaida-linked suspects standing trial for the 2003 suicide bombings in Istanbul told a court that jihad, or holy war, was an obligation for Muslims and [so.....] his clients should not be prosecuted.
"If you punish them for this, tomorrow, will you punish them for fasting or for praying?" Osman Karahan -- a lawyer representing 14 of the 72 suspects -- asked during a nearly four-hour speech in which he read religious texts from an encyclopedia of Islam.
The November 2003 blasts targeted two synagogues, the British Consulate and the local headquarters of the London-based HSBC bank, killing 58 people.
The Arabic word jihad can mean holy war among extremists in addition to its definition as the Islamic concept of the struggle to do good.
Karahan spoke for three hours at the court in Istanbul.

http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2440692005   now a dead link. ((

try...
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/009487.php