A 21-year-old young man was sentenced Friday, November 20 to eight years in prison by the Bas-Rhin Assize Court for having killed a 73-year-old man by hitting him in a car while he was doing a "
rodeo
" in a park in Strasbourg.
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Tried for "
violence with use or threat of a weapon resulting in death without intention of giving it
", the accused received a sentence in accordance with the requisitions of the attorney general, Eric Lallement, the prosecutor general of the court call from Colmar.
"
It is a relief for the members of the family
" of the victim, declared Me Christophe Cervantes, lawyer of the civil parties.
“
The accident thesis did not fit.
The Assize Court accepted the thesis of the crime, it was important for them to hear it.
"Conversely, Me Slim Benchaabane, lawyer for the accused, said"
in the most absolute incomprehension
".
"
I cannot explain myself, or else by considerations which have nothing to do with legal matters, this quantum of penalty
", he declared.
During the pleadings, he asked for the reclassification of the facts as manslaughter, aggravated by a hit-and-run.
"
When I hit a pedestrian, we have to wonder under what conditions I was able to see it or not, and if my desire was to reach it,
" he told AFP.
“
The texts say no crime without intention to commit it.
When I enter a park with a car, the only will is to be a jerk.
"
Out for a walk with your dog
In December 2018, the victim, a lawyer, was walking his dog in the park of a city of Strasbourg in the early evening when the car driven by the condemned had struck it at a speed close to 30 km / h, shortly after a turn around.
The septuagenarian died on the spot.
The driver had fled and then tried to hide the traces of the collision on the vehicle.
The convict, then a young holder of a driving license, admitted the facts during his trial, explaining that he wanted to slide in the park to have fun with two friends, without thinking about the consequences, according to the Latest from Alsace (DNA).
“
I wanted to be smart.
I didn't have to go into the park.
A man died and it's my fault,
”he admitted, according to the newspaper.
At the end of nearly a year and a half of investigation, the investigating magistrates and the prosecution had ruled out the thesis of murder or aggravated violence, to retain that of aggravated manslaughter, a fact constituting an offense and not 'a crime.
But after the appeal of the civil parties, the investigating chamber had retained the qualification of aggravated willful violence, returning the suspect to the Assize Court.
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