Brussels Court Sentences Notorious Drug Trafficker to 7 Years for Failed Prison Break Attempt

On Thursday, the Brussels correctional court sentenced Mohammed Benabdelhak to seven years in prison for facts dating back to April 13, 2014, reports Courrier Picard. On that day, a commando of armed men had opened fire around 8 pm on the Saint-Gilles prison (a suburb of Brussels) after police had denied them access. These criminals had tried to help the Franco-Moroccan from Creil (Oise) escape, who was suspected of being the head of a drug trafficking network from Morocco. In court, the 42-year-old man denied any involvement in the facts last October, but the justice system does not believe him. According to the jury, it was indeed he who had "commissioned his escape with the support of people coming from France".

This attempted escape had led to the opening of a judicial investigation in Belgium. The investigations reveal that the murders of the Hilger brothers, figures of the Belgian organized crime, whose bodies, which had been dissolved in acid baths, were found in March 2016 in the trunk of a car fished out of a canal near Charleroi, could be linked to this attempted escape. The arson of the National Institute of Criminology and Criminalistics as well. Evidence, including a shoe, in this double assassination was destroyed in this fire. The promise of 2 million euros to help the man from Creil escape is also mentioned.

Benabdelhak had managed to escape from the Beauvais (northern France) prison in November 2008, after the attack of a convoy by a group of armed assailants with Kalashnikovs. He had taken refuge in Morocco, his country of origin. This spectacular escape earned him 12 years in prison. After his release, he returned to Europe.