A Moroccan court acquitted Wednesday Reda Abakrim, an alleged drug baron, of a murder committed in France in 2007, reports AFP.
The criminal chamber of a Casablanca court “acquitted him, he will be released,” said AFP, quoting the lawyer for the civil party Mohamed Aghanaj, who will appeal the decision.
Reda Abakrim, alias “Turbo,” was arrested on December 22, 2020 at Casablanca airport after narrowly escaping from Dubai where investigators from the French Office for Combating Drug Trafficking were on his tail.
“He was first arrested for using a false passport before the police discovered that he was the subject of an international arrest warrant after a 21-year prison sentence in France in a murder case related to drug trafficking,” Aghanaj, who defends the victim’s parents, told AFP.
This man, “priority target” of the French Office, had been on the run since 2007, date of the murder in a housing estate in Poissy , Paris region, of Brahim Hajaji.
In this case, he was sentenced in absentia in June 2020 to 21 years of criminal imprisonment by the Court of Versailles.
In Morocco, he was prosecuted for “participation in a kidnapping, sequestration and voluntary manslaughter” in the same case “because he holds Moroccan nationality,” said Mohamed Aghanaj, who expressed “surprise” at his acquittal to AFP.
Reda Abakrim, 40 years old, is considered by investigators as one of the biggest exporters of cannabis from Morocco to France.
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