Investigation Reveals Deadly Exorcism Case in France, Sparking Concerns

"One day I learned that a very close member of my family had been exorcised. [...] I was stunned. It’s too violent, absurd. Exorcism is Hollywood blockbuster material, not the beginning of a family saga," Lou Syrah tells the magazine Le Point. The necessary trigger came when she discovered a news item on the internet. It was the death of Louisa in Roubaix, after an exorcism session.

According to the facts, for nearly five hours, Louisa was made to drink several liters of water, shaken, whipped on the feet, and held by the throat. After several hours of mistreatment, she fell into a coma and died the next day. Cause cited: pulmonary drowning, caused by the massive ingestion of salt water.

The personality of the exorcist is striking. This man, originally from Algeria, was one of the first Frenchmen to return to France with the Saudi theological background. He practiced the exorcism that the Saudis call "roqya sharia". "Saudi-style exorcism is part of Hanbalism, one of the legal schools of Islam that will inspire Wahhabism," the journalist says.

She says that roqya sharia has quickly spread in France. Including hijama. "It’s a practice that resembles the cupping bloodletting that our grandparents used to do, except that it involves invoking God during the session," explains Lou Syrah. According to her, the practice of Saudi-style exorcism has exploded in thirty years. And in some countries like Algeria, there have been so many victims that the government at one point considered banning it. Except that "in France, we often talk about Islam to refer to the shortcomings of its institutions or the most radicalized fringes," the author points out.