PARIS (AP) — A decade after robbers stormed Kim Kardashian’s luxurious residence and tied her up at gunpoint, a Paris court docket is about Friday to resolve the decision in probably the most audacious superstar heists in trendy French historical past.
9 males and a lady stand accused of finishing up — or aiding — the crime throughout the 2016 Paris Vogue Week, when masked males dressed as police entered Kardashian’s Paris house, sure her with zip-ties and vanished with $6 million in jewels.
On the coronary heart of the trial is 70-year-old Aomar Aït Khedache, a veteran of Paris’ prison underworld. Prosecutors have requested for a 10-year sentence. His DNA, discovered on the zip-ties used to bind Kardashian, cracked open the case. Wiretaps captured him giving orders, recruiting accomplices, and arranging to promote the diamonds in Belgium. The loot was by no means discovered.
Khedache claims he was solely a foot soldier. He blamed a mysterious “X” or “Ben” — somebody prosecutors say by no means existed.
The accused turned identified in France as “les papys braqueurs” — the grandpa robbers. Some arrived in court docket in orthopedic sneakers and one leaned on a cane. Some learn the proceedings from a display screen, exhausting of listening to and practically mute. However prosecutors warned observers to not be seduced by smooth appearances.
The trial is being heard by a panel of three judges and 6 jurors, who will want a majority vote to achieve a verdict.
The defendants face fees together with armed theft, kidnapping and gang affiliation. If convicted, they may face life in jail.
Kardashian’s testimony earlier this month was the emotional excessive level. In a packed courtroom, she recounted how she was thrown onto a mattress, zip-tied, and had a gun pressed to her on the evening of Oct. 2, 2016.
“I absolutely did think I was going to die,” she mentioned. “I have babies. I have to make it home. They can take everything. I just have to make it home.”
She was dragged right into a marble lavatory and instructed to remain silent. When the robbers fled, she freed herself by scraping the tape on her wrists off in opposition to the sink, then she hid along with her pal, shaking and barefoot.
She mentioned Paris had as soon as been her sanctuary — a metropolis she would wander at 3 a.m., window buying, stopping for warm chocolate. That phantasm was shattered.
The theft echoed far past the Metropolis of Mild. It pressured a recalibration of superstar habits within the digital age. For years, Kardashian had curated her life like a showroom: geo-tagged, diamond-lit, public by design. However this was the second the showroom became against the law scene. In her phrases, “People were watching… They knew where I was.”
Afterward, she stopped posting her location in actual time. She stripped her social media feed of lavish items and vanished from Paris for years. Different stars adopted swimsuit. Privateness turned luxurious.
Protection attorneys have requested the court docket for leniency, citing the defendants’ age and well being. However prosecutors insist that prison expertise, not frailty, outlined the gang.
On Friday morning, the accused will communicate one last time earlier than the court docket withdraws to deliberate.
Even for France’s painstakingly thorough authorized system, observers commented about how lengthy it took for the case to be tried.
Kardashian, who as soon as mentioned “this experience really changed everything,” hopes the decision will supply a measure of closure.
