Legionnaire Acquitted in Fatal Paris Knife Fight, Court Rules Self-Defense

The newspaper Le Parisien recalls the scene that one would readily qualify as self-defense. The facts date back to May 3, 2014. The aggressor, aged 28, had struck the soldier with a knife, piercing his left hand. Brahim A. then seized the weapon and took a defensive stance. The fight ended with the death of his opponent, victim of seven knife wounds, including one, fatal, to the thigh.

At the bar, Brahim, 32, a former soldier of the 1st Foreign Engineer Regiment, now a mechanic, who appeared free for "aggravated fatal blows", explained that he never wished the death of this unknown person who had come to bother him and his girlfriend by offering them drugs. In his last words, in this trial that lasted 4 days, Bahim declared: "I’m sorry, I never wanted it to happen like this. But, no matter how many times I replay the scene in my head, I don’t see how I could have done otherwise."

At the time of this scene of violence, which lasted 2 minutes, the media recalls that the victim, aged 28, who had already been convicted for drug trafficking and intentional violence, was intoxicated and under cannabis.

After an hour of deliberation, the Court and the jurors acquitted the former soldier of the 1st Foreign Engineer Regiment, born in Morocco, last Friday, considering that he did not voluntarily inflict the knife blows, including the fatal one on the victim, concludes the same source.