France media attacker jailed for 25 years

PARIS: A French court has sentenced a man who wounded a photographer in a shooting in 2013 to 25 years behind bars, in a case that predated the string of jihadist attacks that has since struck the country. Abdelhakim Dekhar, now 52, was arrested in November 2013 following a major manhunt after he broke into the headquarters of the BFMTV channel.
There, he threatened journalist Philippe Antoine with a shotgun, and said: “Next time, I won´t miss.” Three days later, still on the run, he managed to stage a shooting attack at the offices of left-wing newspaper Liberation, also in Paris, that left a photographer´s assistant seriously hurt.
There was also a separate incident where shots were fired at the headquarters of the Societe Generale bank. The court found him guilty of attempted murder of Philippe Antoine, now chief editor at BFMTV, and Cesar Sebastien, the wounded photographer´s assistant at Liberation.
Prosecutor Bernard Farret had argued that “spite” had been Dekhar´s main motive, adding that the shooter harboured “resentment against society, the state and capitalism”. Dekhar, sentenced on Friday, was considering filing an appeal, his lawyer Hugo Levy said. Of the total, Dekhar will only be eligible for parole once he has served two thirds of his sentence.