After three days of trial, the Seine-Saint-Denis Assize Court sentenced Lansana Sylla, 54, to 30 years in prison on Thursday evening.
A verdict faithful to the requisitions of the Advocate General.
On December 30, 2017 in Montreuil, during a marital dispute in their apartment on the 4th floor, the accused had stabbed his wife, Mariama, 32, 23 times.
He had subjected her to the worst violence, then he had kicked off the kitchen window and pushed the young woman, still alive, into the void.
The scene had lasted a long hour, under the eyes of the horrified neighbors.
Despite the attempted intervention of one of them and the pleas of the women, nothing had been able to stop Lansana in her murderous madness.
The testimonies of the neighbors convinced the jurors
Before the Assize Court, the latter consistently denied his responsibility.
He struggled to reverse roles and got stuck in denial repeating that it was Mariama, who had tried to stab him and that it was she again, who had stepped over the window and threw herself from the 4th. stage.
A scenario that has never convinced the Advocate General. He relied on the corroborating testimonies of a dozen neighbors. He also pointed out that the accused regularly beat his wife. In this heavy context, it was impossible for Me Stephan Boudon, his lawyer, to win the support of the jurors. Many elements in the file, in particular the localization of the knife wounds, placed the responsibility on Lansana Sylla.
A witness explained that he clearly saw the accused grab his wife by the ankles and throw her out the window.
The defense attacked this testimony: "In front of the police, he said that he had not seen Lansana".
Me Boudon also lamented that the video did not offer a clear enough image to incriminate his client.
To plead Lansana Sylla's cause, he returned to his chaotic journey and the omnipotence of the family clan, which continued to rule his life from Guinea, his native country.
The weight of the family
“Lansana was built with the image of a father who sacrificed himself for his family.
When he died he had to give up his studies, his dream of becoming a journalist and working in a diamond mine, ”Mr. Boudon recalled.
Then he chose to emigrate to France.
But even from a distance, his mother retained an important hold over the life of her eldest son.
It was she who chose his future wife.
“This marriage has been arranged.
Neither spouse wanted it.
It started badly and was doomed to failure.
Then, it is this same family weight, which maintains it in this union and this small apartment ”, continued the council.
In her married life, Lansana Sylla cannot reproduce the model returned by her father.
When he's not working, he has to ask his wife for money.
"He suffered from not becoming this tutelary head of the clan," pleaded the lawyer.
It only took two hours of deliberation in court to agree on this verdict of thirty years in prison.