French Drug Lord’s Notoriety Complicates Brother’s Legal Battle

Implicated in a case of cannabis importation between Spain and Dreux (Eure-et-Loir), Nordine remains in prison. The Paris investigation chamber rejected his request for release on September 17, reports Le Parisien. The celebrity of his elder brother, Bouchaïb El Kacimi alias "Bouch de Dreux" does not make his life easier. The latter had been arrested in France in 2018, for a case of identity theft. Considered the head of a vast cannabis resin import network, this Franco-Moroccan would be on the run in Morocco. He had been sentenced to 20 years in prison. He is credited with 45 go-fasts organized from Spain in 14 months to import 50 tons of cannabis.

According to a source close to the defense, the refusal of his client’s release is linked to his brother. "Bouch de Dreux has fled and so Nordine will also do so. There is no genetic risk of flight, it must not be created to make up for the shortcomings of the prosecution," she indignantly told the investigation chamber.

The case for which Nordine is under investigation dates back to 2020 and followed information gathered on a network of cannabis resin and herb importers specialized in "Go Fast" between Spain and Dreux (Eure-et-Loir) by investigators from the narcotics brigade of the judicial police of Versailles in December 2019. In August 2020, the law enforcement intercepted a convoy, arrested the suspects from the carrier car that was transporting 396 kg of resin, those ensuring the security of the transport and the mule, seized 45 kg of grass contained in forty bags hidden in a box, arrested sixteen other suspects. Nordine, for his part, was located and arrested with another accomplice on September 10, 2020 in Bagnolet (Seine-Saint-Denis).

According to the investigators, this 29-year-old young man intended to get involved in international drug trafficking. But Nordine’s criminal record is clean and his activity would be the online sale of automotive spare parts.