Teen who lied about beheaded French teacher's class says 'sorry'

by Alain JEAN-ROBERT

A teenager whose lies about her teacher are accused of contributing to the educator's murder by an Islamist radical apologized to his family in a French court on Tuesday.

Eight people have been on trial since early November, charged with contributing to the climate of hatred that led to an 18-year-old of Chechen origin beheading teacher Samuel Paty outside Paris in 2020.

They include Brahim Chnina, the 52-year-old Moroccan father of the adolescent testifying Tuesday.

Then aged 13, the adolescent falsely claimed that Paty had asked Muslim students to leave his classroom before showing caricatures of the prophet Mohammed.

She was not in the classroom at the time.

"I would like to apologize to the family," the 17-year-old, who has not been named, told the court. "I destroyed your lives, I am sorry."

Also on trial is Abdelhakim Sefrioui, a 65-year-old French-Moroccan Islamist activist.

He and Chnina spread the teenager's lies on social networks with the aim, according to the prosecution, of "designating a target", "provoking a feeling of hatred" and "thus preparing several crimes".

Both men have been in pre-trial detention for the past four years.

The teenager told the court that she lied to her mother to justify why she had been suspended from school for two days over her behavior and repeated absences.

"I was in panic and stress," she said. "I told her I had been in class and that I wasn't happy with what went on there and that the teacher excluded me. That we looked at cartoons."

- 'I thought somebody would stop me' -

Sefrioui posted a video describing Paty as a "teaching thug".

He also staged an "interview" with the teenager outside the school, whispering to her what to answer. The adolescent dutifully reiterated the falsehoods.

"I thought somebody would stop me in my lying, but nobody ever said that I wasn't in class," she told the court Tuesday.

She stuck to her story even after Paty's death. Only following her arrest and 30 hours of interrogation did she admit to investigators that she had made it all up.

The teenager, whose delivery in court was matter-of-fact, showed emotion only when she talked about her father.

"Without my lies, none of us would be here," she said, sobbing. "I used my father's naivete and kindness."

She added that "my father says you must always respect teachers", a remark that prompted an astonished "really?" interjected by the court's presiding judge.

The teenager was sentenced to 18 months of probation in December 2023 after being convicted of slander.

Paty had used the Charlie Hebdo magazine as part of an ethics class to discuss free speech laws in France, where blasphemy is legal and cartoons mocking religious figures have a long history.

His killing took place just weeks after Charlie Hebdo republished the Prophet Mohammed cartoons.

After the magazine used the images in 2015, Islamist gunmen stormed its offices, killing 12 people.

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© Agence France-Presse

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