Sentences ranging from ten months suspended to four years in prison for “hotel rats”. The magistrates of the 14th chamber of the Paris Criminal Court delivered their judgment this afternoon in the trial of the robbers of luxury hotels in Paris and the south of France. Although the seven defendants were acquitted of the charge of criminal conspiracy, they were all found guilty of theft during meetings or complicity.
Several thefts in the 8th arrondissement
Belkheir Z., suspected of being the mastermind of the burglaries, received the heaviest sentence in the case: 4 years’ imprisonment with continued detention accompanied by a fine of 10,000 euros.
All his accomplices were sentenced to prison, sometimes to be carried out under an electronic bracelet, with the exception of two of them, sentenced to suspended prison sentences.
The courts accused them all of all or part of a series of thefts that occurred in hotels in Paris, particularly in the 8th arrondissement, and on the Côte d’Azur, between August 2024 and February 2025. Around twenty thefts were targeted by the procedure. Their loot? Objects (watches, bags, etc.) mainly from luxury brands. Some of the defendants had been filmed and identified using video surveillance, entering or attempting to enter rooms in the hotels concerned. This did not prevent them from denying any involvement in the thefts. “We went in to steal, but we didn’t touch anything,” said one of them at the hearing, for example, recognizing his presence, and his presence only, at the scene of the thefts.
Originally published at Almouwatin.com
