Eight on trial four years after extremist beheaded teacher over Prophet cartoons

The trial of eight people accused of involvement in the beheading of history teacher Samuel Paty outside his school near Paris in 2020 by a radicalised man of Chechen origin started on Monday, and is scheduled to run for almost seven weeks. They all appeared at the Court of Paris, including Brahim Chnina, the 52-year-old Moroccan father of a teenage girl who in December received an 18-month suspended sentence for lodging false accusations against Mr Paty in October 2020.

The claims made by the girl, who was 13 years old at the time, alleged that she had protested after Mr Paty had forced Muslim pupils to leave the room while he showed caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed published by the magazine Charlie Hebdo. The allegations were amplified online by her father against a backdrop of numerous terrorist attacks in France, including against Charlie Hebdo in 2015.

Two weeks later, Mr Paty was tracked down, stabbed and killed in the street by 18 year old Abdoullakh Anzorov, a Russian of Chechen origin, who was searching for a victim. He was shot dead by police.

Mr Paty's sister, Gaelle Paty, attended the first day of the trial. The killing of Mr Paty has become a symbol for the fight for freedom of expression in France, which is strongly attached to its idea of laicite, or secularism, which keeps religion separated from the state. Mr Paty showed the Charlie Hebdo caricatures as part of a class he had given for several years without encountering any issues. Its title was: "The dilemma about supporting Charlie Hebdo or not: a definition of freedom".

He had told Muslim pupils they could look away while the Charlie Hebdo caricatures were shown but had not asked them to leave, facts that stand in contrast to the claims made by the teenage girl, who was absent that day and had lied to her parents to cover up her absence and subsequent two-day exclusion from school.

With the support of an extremist Islamist French-Moroccan figure, 65 year old Abdelhakim Sefrioui, Mr Chnina published a video online of his daughter’s accusations against Mr Paty, who became the target of death threats. In the video, Mr Chnina accused Mr Paty of being a "thug", an accusation echoed in a subsequent video published by Mr Sefrioui, who claimed Mr Paty had insulted Islam.

Prosecutors accuse Mr Chnina and Mr Sefrioui of conspiring to create a climate of hatred which led to Mr Paty’s death. The two men, who could face up to 30 years in prison for terrorist conspiracy, pursued Mr Paty despite a one-on-one meeting with the school director in which the reasons for the exclusion of Mr Chnina’s daughter were explained.

Prosecutors also allege that it was their videos that gave Mr Anzorov, who lived as a refugee in France, the idea of killing Mr Paty. Speaking to journalists outside Monday’s hearing, Mr Sefrioui’s lawyers argued that he is innocent because Mr Anzorov had taken his decision before the publication of their client’s video.

Mr Chnina’s daughter was sentenced separately last year alongside five other adolescents for charges related to taking part in a pre-meditated criminal conspiracy and helping to prepare an ambush. A number of them had taken cash from Mr Anzorov to give information about Mr Paty’s whereabouts on the day of his death. Mr Paty is reported to have lived his last days in fear, carrying a hammer in his backpack for protection.

Also on trial are Mr Anzorov’s friends Naim Boudaoud, 22, and Azim Epsirokhanov, 23, who are accused of accompanying him to buy the knife used to stab and behead Mr Paty. They could face life in prison for complicity in the killing.

A woman, Priscilla Mangel, 36, stands accused of encouraging Mr Anzorov in his extremist opinions via private messages on Twitter. She is not currently in custody, in common with three others accused in the trial who face similar accusations: Ismail Gamaev, Louqmane Ingar and Yusuf Cinar. They could also face 30-year sentences for terrorist conspiracy.