The hate campaign against Samuel Paty “unequivocally led the terrorist to choose (Samuel Paty) as a target in his attack project” committed on October 16, 2020, according to the Interior Minister. Laurent Nunez “has the certainty of a causal link” between the online hate campaign targeting Samuel Paty and his murder, he stated in a second appearance at the special assizes court of Paris, a move criticized by the defense as a “variation of the Nunez witness.” The hate campaign orchestrated by Islamist militant Abdelhakim Sefrioui and a student’s parent, Brahim Chnina, currently on trial, “unequivocally led the terrorist to choose (Samuel Paty) as a target in his attack project” according to the Interior Minister.
In a subsequent statement, Nunez emphasized that there is a “certain causal link between the publications of the two defendants and the violent death of Samuel Paty,” who was decapitated near the Bois d’Aulne school in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine by the jihadist Abdoullakh Anzorov for showing cartoons of Muhammad during a lesson on freedom of expression. This “causal link” is, for Nunez, a “certainty supported by a precise understanding of the case,” which was his position. An attorney for Brahim Chnina described this new comment as an “indisputable variation of Nunez’s testimony” that could amount to perjury.
The defense attorneys for Abdelhakim Sefrioui criticized the minister’s statement, highlighting concerns about impartiality and separation of powers. The initial ruling in 2024 had pointed out their “causal” role in the sequence of events leading to the murder, sentencing Chnina and Sefrioui to 13 and 15 years in prison for criminal association.
