Paris, Mar. 10, (dpa/GNA) – A court in Paris has sentenced three men to lengthy prison terms for an Islamist assassination attempt on a priest in France more than five years ago.
The men, who the court found guilty of preparing the attack, were handed sentences of between 8 and 13 years in prison on Wednesday, news agency AFP reported.
Two attackers first took six people, hostage, during morning Mass on July 26, 2016, in a Catholic church in Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray near Rouen in northern France.
Then they murdered the 85-year-old priest Jacques Hamel. However, a nun was able to escape and raise the alarm.
Both attackers were shot by the police. One parishioner was seriously injured.
The Islamic State extremist group claimed responsibility for the attack, which provoked horror far beyond France’s borders.
Both perpetrators had already been targeted by the authorities on suspicion of terrorism.
A fourth man, considered an instigator of the attack, was also formally charged and was tried in absentia. He is thought to have died in a bombing raid in Iraq.
GNA