Haute-Garonne: “They robbed my 6-year-old daughter with a weapon”… four men sentenced to 6 to 10 years in prison
In June 2019, in the middle of the night near Saint-Lys west of Toulouse, a couple was screamed out of bed. The intruders were looking for a safe that didn’t exist. Four years later, before the Assize Court, the trauma remains raw.
Her face reflects sleepless nights. And before the jurors of the Assize Court of Haute-Garonne, the voice of this mother expresses anguish, fear, anger. On June 26, 2019 in Saiguède near Saint-Lys, in the middle of the night, this woman was taken out of bed by armed individuals hidden under balaclavas. “They were screaming. They made my husband get up. They wanted the safe. We don’t have a safe… They searched, ransacked the house.”
A gold chain, a bottle of Jack Daniel’s, 50 packs of cigarettes, €350 and a handbag are stolen. Plus two cars that the gendarmes will quickly find: a BMW in Muret, in front of the hostel for young workers where two of the accused lived; a Hummer, burned 24 hours later and totally destroyed.
A curious loot, not very professional, and investigations that the investigators of the Research Section (SR) of Toulouse, and the Research Brigade (BR) of the Toulouse-Mirail company will quickly accelerate. The four authors, who left many traces during their journey, were arrested a month later.
Facing the jurors, four women and two men, these young men, now aged 24 and 25, marked by prison, recognized their “descent” into this house. Randomly ? Not really. One of them was dating the couple and their eldest daughter.
“How to live after?”
“He had known her since she was 4 years old! He played with her in her room!” Reproaches the mother, disgusted. Of these 15 minutes of aggression “which lasted for hours”, admits the husband, his wife has forgotten nothing. Especially not when she was forced to pick up her daughter. “Her bed was empty. I screamed, panicked, this woman is crying. In fact, she was hiding under the bed…”
To get her out of hiding, one of the attackers threatened her with a gun. “How can you do that to a 6-year-old girl?”
Not one defendant dares to look at this angry mother whose distress Me Frédéric David bears. “What remains if, even at home, in your bed, you are no longer protected? How to live afterwards?” Advocate General Pierre Aurignac makes no difference between the four men and requires 8 years in prison.
Defended by Me Pierre-Yves Gougnaud, Adem Mehidi, who was a repeat offender, was sentenced to 10 years in prison; Corentin Arsague, the client of Me Marie-Léa Boukoulou, and James Tramoni, represented by Mes Maylis Vincent and Raphaël Darribère, to 8 years in prison; Roman Perez defended by Me Jean-Marc Denjean to 6 years in prison.