Spanish Prosecutors Seek Decades-Long Sentences for 2017 Barcelona Attack Suspects

It is through a document obtained by AFP that the media were informed of the sentences requested against the three terrorists. The toll of this double attack was 16 dead, 140 injured. The Spanish prosecutor’s office has requested a sentence of 8 years against Said Ben Iazza for collaboration with a terrorist organization. He had lent a van to the cell. A sentence of 36 years has been requested against Driss Oukabir for having rented in his name the van used for the attack on the Ramblas in Barcelona.

The prosecution has requested the heaviest sentence of 41 years against Mohamed Houli Chemlal for membership in a terrorist organization and possession of explosives. He is a survivor of the explosion of the house where the cell was manufacturing explosives.

A 22-year-old jihadist had targeted the Ramblas in Barcelona. A car-ramming attack was carried out, killing 14 people. The assailant fled by car after killing the driver. Shortly after, five of his accomplices had attacked passers-by with knives in the Catalan seaside resort of Cambrils. A woman was stabbed to death. Another person succumbed to their injuries.

The police had subsequently shot dead these six jihadists of Moroccan origin. The latter would have been indoctrinated by Abdelbaki Es Satty, a 44-year-old Moroccan, former imam in the small town of Ripoll in Catalonia. These young people were supposed to carry out "several large-scale explosive attacks" on the Basilica of the Sagrada Familia, the stadiums of FC Barcelona or Real Madrid or the Eiffel Tower in Paris, etc.

However, the accidental explosion of their hideout had prompted them to improvise this double attack. The explosion had caused the death of Imam Es Satty.