Murder of Abdelkader, 17, at Mas de Mingue: the trial of the nine accused under very close surveillance

Extraordinary means for an extraordinary trial. Nine defendants have been on trial since Monday before the Gard Assize Court for a murder and an attempted murder committed on January 25, 2021 at Mas de Mingue. Large numbers of police officers and heavily armed prison guards secure the area around the courthouse and the courtroom. This Tuesday, when the debates resume, the lawyers are stepping up to demand that the pirate recording be excluded from the debates. The recording was made with a micro-spy hidden in a USB key, hidden in the apartment, a sort of HQ, of drug traffickers. This recording gave rise to 25 hours of conversations where some suspects talk about replica attacks and drug trafficking. Mr. Hugo Ferri, the lawyer for one of the accused, protests the conditions under which the USB key was handed over to the investigation services. The lawyer explains that the key was handed over by his client after criminals broke his knees with a hammer.

All defense lawyers are calling for the recordings to be excluded. The court will rule on this request later. The trial continues with the victim’s families in the room. Thus, the brothers, father and other members of the family of young Abdelkader, killed at 17, after a shooting, attended the trial where nine men were tried. Some for their involvement in the criminal acts, others for criminal conspiracy, in this case for having been involved in the affair with weapons, the burning of a car, the purchase of bulletproof vests.

The accused generally refute any link with the criminal acts

Monday evening, two defendants admitted minimal involvement. One of them confessed to having participated in drug trafficking but overall the seven accused refute any role in the death of the teenager hit in a shooting against the backdrop of a turf war between the drug traffickers of Mas de Mingue and those of Chemin-Bas-d’Avignon.