Assassination by mistake: exemplary sentences in the Houcine Hakkar affair

The Doubs Assize Court delivered its verdict in the case of the murder of Houcine Hakkar, 23, shot by mistake in March 2020 in Besançon. This five-day trial revealed the underside of drug trafficking and the rivalries that led to this tragedy. After six hours of deliberations, the sentences were handed down, heavy and final.

Elias Basbas, the alleged shooter, and Mohamed Mordjane, the supposed instigator, received thirty years of criminal imprisonment. Mordjane, said to be on the run in Morocco, is the subject of an international arrest warrant and was sentenced in absentia. Melk Ghezali, the driver of the vehicle, was sentenced to 25 years in prison. His admission of the facts did not lighten his sentence, even if the attorney general had requested a slightly lesser sentence for him.