Dahbia Benkired, 26, was found guilty by a Paris court of luring the girl into an apartment, sexually assaulting her, and killing her in what judges described as “true torture.” Investigators said Benkired used scissors and a box cutter during the attack before suffocating the child and hiding her body in a suitcase, reports GB News.
The Paris Assize Court handed down the harshest punishment available under French law, the same sentence given to Salah Abdeslam, the surviving terrorist behind the 2015 Paris Bataclan Islamic terror attacks. Life imprisonment without parole is the maximum penalty since France abolished the death penalty in 1981.
“The court took into account the unspeakable psychological damage to the victim and her family in such violent and almost unspeakable circumstances,” the judge said in court.
Prosecutors described Benkired as exhibiting “psychopathic traits” but fully aware of her actions. “Make no mistake: no drug treatment can fundamentally transform Ms. Benkired’s personality. When there is no illness, there is no treatment,” one prosecutor stated.
Benkired had been living in France illegally at the time of the murder. She entered the country on a student visa but failed to renew it. In July 2022, three months before the murder, she was detained at a Paris airport and given 30 days to leave the country, but authorities never enforced her deportation order.
National Rally president Jordan Bardella said Benkired “had no business being in France.” Nationalist Eric Zemmour called the killing “Francocide,” the murder of a French person, saying the crime “should never have been allowed to happen.”
Lola's father, Johan Daviet, later died, reportedly after struggling with alcoholism following the killing. During the trial, Lola’s brother Thibault told the court their father “is unfortunately no longer here because of the same person.”
After the verdict, Lola’s mother Delphine said, “Even if this won’t bring my Lola back, we believed in justice and we got it. Thank you.”
Marine Le Pen, leader of the National Rally, praised the court’s decision. “By applying the most severe punishment provided for in the criminal code, the justice system has not shirked its responsibilities,” she said, adding that France should seek “systematic deportation of foreign criminal offenders.”
