Trial opens of two teenagers accused of murdering 14-year-old Alisha
The murder trial has opened at Pontoise near Paris of two minors who are accused of having harassed, beaten and then thrown 14-year-old secondary school student Alisha into the river Seine, where she drowned. The trial will continue behind closed doors.
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The alleged killers, a boy and a girl, were 15 years old at the time of the events in March 2021. If found guilty, they each face 20 years in prison.
French legal procedure is very strict in trials involving underaged accused. The identities of all parties, and the details of the court hearing, will be strictly protected.
None of the lawyers present at the opening wished to make a statement to the press.
Alisha drowned in the Seine on 8 March 2021, having been violently beaten by two classmates. It is alleged that the pair harassed the victim in the wake of the publication on the social platform Snapchat of photos of Alisha in her underwear some days prior to her death.
According to police investigators, Alisha was confronted by a girl from her class on an isolated pathway under the A15 motorway near the suburb of Argenteuil. The two girls were then joined by a boy who, without warning, struck the victim several times in the face, knocking her to the ground.
The police suspect that the pair, anxious to conceal the evidence of the attack, then lifted the victim and threw her into the river.
The male attacker returned home, his clothes covered in blood, and told his mother what had happened. She immediately contacted the police.
The two suspects, having changed their clothes, then went, "without any sign of panic", into Paris for a meal.
Dead because of "youthful stupidities"
The three teenagers were all students at the Cognacq-Jay private professional secondary school in Argenteuil. They met at the start of the school year in September 2020.
An initially friendly trio, they became separated over teenage love affairs and what the authorities describe as "youthful stupidities".
Alisha had her phone pirated in February 2021, and photos of her dressed in underwear began to appear on Snapchat.
She was, the investigators say, the target of the adolescent equivalent of a revenge-porn campaign.
It is alleged that Alisha was involved in a physical fight with the girl accused, and that the boy felt his dead father had been the victim of an insult. As a result, the two accused were temporarily suspended by the school authorities.
A public march was held in Argenteuil a few days after the tragic death of Alisha. She had planned to become an accountant, according to her mother.
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