The Case of Sarah Halimi

On April 4th 2017, 65-year-old Sarah Halimi was murdered. Kobili Traoré is accused of killing the Jewish woman, beating her and throwing her from the apartment balcony. It is alleged that Traoré entered Halimi’s apartment at 4am and beat her while crying “Allahu Akbar” and reciting Quranic verses, before throwing her over the balcony of her third-floor council flat. Neighbours told police they heard Traoré shout “I killed the sheitan” (the Arabic word for “devil”). While Traoré did admit to police that he was aware that Halimi was Jewish, he denied antisemitic reasons behind the crime and instead stated that he had acted while in a psychotic episode triggered by cannabis.

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There was an outcry from Jewish organization globally in response to Halimi’s murder and the subsequent actions taken by officials, who for a long time refused to make an official link to antisemitism. It took over 10 months for French authorities to accept an element of antisemitism in the case.  

Now, France’s highest courts have ruled that Traoré is not criminally responsible for the case, and therefore he will not be going to trial. The court ruled that while there was enough evidence to show that Traoré had antisemitic motives, his “delirious state” at the time of the crime means he cannot stand trial. “According to unanimous opinions of different psychiatry experts, that man was presenting at the time of the facts a severe delirious state,” the court stated. 

This decision sparked protests in in Paris, Bordeaux, Marseille, Lyon, Strasbourg and Nice, as well as in Rome, Tel Aviv, London, Los Angeles, Miami and New York. President of LICRA Mario Stasi, Get The Trolls Out! partner in France said the following on the case, initiating a petition: 

“In your name, I asked Madame Anne Hidalgo, mayor of Paris, that the street where Sarah Halimi was murdered because she was Jewish now bears her name, so that no one ignores the martyrdom of this victim of anti-Semitism and that forever, its history resonates in the minds of passers-by and residents. I will take other initiatives, in the coming days, with our public partners, so that we are all up to the challenges and the memory of Sarah Halimi.”