Former PSG President’s Butler Files Kidnapping Complaint, Alleges Extortion

In his complaint, Hicham Karmoussi, of Moroccan origin, claims to have suffered enormous pressure because he is suspected of holding sensitive information about his former boss, reports Libération. He "wishes in particular to denounce the conditions in which he signed a settlement agreement aimed at allowing the release of Tayeb Benabderrahmane, then detained in Qatar," said his lawyer, Me Antoine Ory, in a statement.

Fired in the summer of 2020 after spending twenty years in the service of the president of the Parisian club, Hicham Karmoussi also filed a complaint for complicity in attempted kidnapping, corruption of a public official, criminal conspiracy, invasion of privacy, interference with an automated data processing system and violation of correspondence secrecy. According to a spokesman for Nasser Al-Khelaïfi, the latter is "a victim" of a "pathetic smear campaign". "We look forward to the conclusion of the case with impatience," he added.

The French justice has been investigating since January an affair of arbitrary arrest and sequestration. The Franco-Algerian lobbyist Tayeb Benabderrahmane claims to have been arrested in January 2020 in Qatar, and held hostage for six months because he would hold compromising documents on Nasser Al-Khelaïfi. He claims to have been allowed to leave Qatar in November 2020, after being placed under house arrest and forced to sign a confidentiality protocol regarding these documents (a mobile phone, a hard drive and a USB key) that Hicham Karmoussi had entrusted to him in 2018.

Compromising documents that the former butler had to surrender in exchange for the release of Tayeb Benabderrahmane, according to a source close to the case. On June 6, justice searched the office of the mayor of the 7th arrondissement of Paris, Rachida Dati, the law firm of lawyer Olivier Pardo who was defending Benabderrahmane, as well as those of Francis Szpiner and Renaud Semerdjian, lawyers for Nasser Al-Khelaïfi. Last week, the home of the PSG boss was also searched. The investigation is ongoing.