Illegal immigrant rapist jailed for torturing 12-year-old schoolgirl to death | World | News

A female illegal immigrant to France was today jailed for life for raping, torturing and then murdering a schoolgirl.

Dahbia Benkired, a 27-year-old Algerian, was on Friday told she would never be released from her cell for ending the life of Lola Daviet.The 12-year-old’s defiled corpse was found in the lobby of the building where she lived in the French capital in 2022.

Benkired had confessed to the killing but, in line with French law, went on trial at the Paris Assizes.

Today she told the court: ‘I ask for forgiveness. What I did was horrible. That’s all I have to say’.

This was just before a jury convicted her conclusively of all three charges of ‘murder, rape and torture’ following almost three hours of deliberations.

The horrific saga has become a hugely political one, because of the way it highlights weak immigration policies.

Demonstrators gathered outside the court building today, calling for the death penalty to be reinstated to deal with Benkired.

She should not even have been in France, after overstaying a student visa, yet was left free to prey on Lola ‘for pleasure and the satisfaction of sexual urges,’ said the Attorney General.

The prosecuting official – who is not named according to French legal convention – said Benkired should spend the rest of her days behind bars, without any chance of parole.

Addressing the jury, the Attorney General said ‘the three crimes are marked by particular cruelty which are all punishable by life imprisonment.

‘They are crimes which plunged a family into unspeakable suffering.

‘Dahbia Benkired is extremely dangerous, and there is a maximum risk of her reoffending.’

The Attorney General called for a life sentence that aims ‘to protect society from a woman whose extreme danger I am firmly convinced of.’

A so called ‘irreducible life sentence’ – which is what Benkired was given – is the harshest penalty possible under the French Penal Code, and often criticised by human rights bodies.

Lola’s mother, Delphine Daviet, 47, was in floods of tears as she faced Benkired in court on Wednesday.

‘Before this tragedy, we had a very simple family life, very attentive to one another,’ said Ms Daviet.

Everything changed on October 14th, 2022, when Lola was abducted from the aparment block where she lived with her parents, and brother.

Recalling their last moments together, Ms Daviet said: ‘I kissed her, I said “See you later”. Then she encoutered this thing – this devil monster.

‘I feel guilty, I couldn’t save my Lola. My husband and my son also blame themselves a lot.’

Benkired attacked Lola sexually, slashed her throat with scissors and a box cutter, and then taped her face with duct tape, which led to her death because she was unable to breath

‘Who could have imagined what would happen when Lola encountered this thing, this monster?’ said Ms Daviet. ‘Why us, why Lola? My mother’s heart is forever broken.’

Ms Daviet’s husband, 49-year-old Johan Daviet, died in February last year, due to heavy drinking related to the family tragedy.

The couple had worked as caretakers in the building from which Lola was abducted by the homeless Benkired.

Ms Daviet said: ‘I tell myself I’m lucky to have my son, Thibault, by my side, otherwise I might not be here anymore.

‘I remind you that I lost my Lola, my husband, my job, my home. My whole life has collapsed. I sometimes wonder how I’m still standing.’

Benkired, who was arrested son after Lola’s corpse was found in a trunk, looked on impassively at such testaments against her continued.

She was examined by psychiatrists and judged able to stand trial.

Éric Pauget, of France’s Republican party, said in parliament that Lola had been killed as a result of France’s ‘weak immigration policies’.

Benkired has been held on remand in Fresnes high security prison, south of Paris, for the last three years.

The historic verdict means Dahbia Benkired becomes the first woman in French criminal history to be sentenced to life in prison without parole.

Men currently serving the same tariff include Salah Abdeslam, the Belgian terrorist who was part of the 10-man ISIS gang that murdered 130 people in one night in Paris in November 2015. 

Abdeslam, 36, is in solitary confinement, and watched round-the-clock by cameras, and Benkired is expected to be treated in the same way in her high-security prison.

Dahbia was emotionless as the verdict was read out, while Delphine Daviet and Thibault Daviet – Lola’s mother and brother – hugged each other, and were in floods of tears. 

Benkired was led down to start her full sentence immediately after her six-day trial.