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A 34-year-old Algerian man living illegally in France appeared in court on Tuesday to face charges of raping a 79-year-old woman in her Paris apartment after meeting her in a grocery store and offering to carry her groceries home.
The incident occurred in April 2024 in the 20th arrondissement of the French capital. The suspect has been remanded in custody since that time.
According to prosecutors, cited by Le Parisien, the man met the victim on April 14, 2024, around 6:30 p.m. at her local grocery store, where he offered his assistance. The elderly woman accepted his help and invited him in for a glass of wine. Prosecutors allege that he then began to touch her and raped her despite her pleas for him to stop. He reportedly left the apartment afterward, telling her they might see each other again.
The elderly woman called the police that same evening to report a sexual assault. When officers visited her the next day, the suspect allegedly phoned her home. A police officer who answered heard him identify himself under a false name. DNA collected from the victim’s chest and clothing later matched the suspect following his arrest.
During questioning, the accused initially denied any sexual contact but later admitted to “sexual gestures,” insisting there had been no penetration. His defense attorney, Julien Zanatta, argues that the case rests largely on the testimony of a vulnerable woman. “When she first called police, she described a sexual assault, and as time went on, the allegations escalated to rape,” Zanatta said. “Her daughter and stepson have said she suffers from cognitive disorders and has previously made false accusations against others.”
“I did not rape this woman,” the man told the court on Tuesday. A mechanic by trade, he has lived in Seine-Saint-Denis for nine years without legal status. He has no prior criminal record, and a psychiatric assessment found no sign of mental illness. Investigators, however, described him as “a man who lives in constant concealment,” with no official address, no registered job, and a drinking problem.
The defense maintains that the DNA evidence only confirms his client’s presence at the apartment and, at most, limited sexual contact, not rape.
Sexual assaults in France by foreign nationals, particularly involving elderly victims, have increased at a disturbing rate in recent years.
Earlier this month, a Guinean migrant living illegally in France was sentenced to 12 years in prison for the rape of an 83-year-old woman during a daytime burglary at her home in La Penne-sur-Huveaune last year.
In September last year, a convicted rapist from Guadeloupe was handed a 20-year prison sentence for the attempted rape of a 102-year-old resident of a nursing home in Rouen.
Other concerning cases involve the rape of a 15-year-old boy stranded at a train station by a homeless Moroccan migrant in December last year. The victim had gone out to celebrate his birthday. In September last year, an illegal Nigerian migrant raped a 38-year-old woman in an underground parking garage of a shopping mall in the French city of Metz, while in February this year, a 52-year-old Moroccan national was arrested on suspicion of raping a 4-year-old girl in a hotel room while the victim’s father drank downstairs in the hotel bar.
Specifically, when it comes to Algerians, most criminals are not deported back to their home country after serving their sentences. Remix News previously reported back in 2022, after the murder of 12-year-old Lola by an Algerian migrant with a deportation order, that just 22 of the 7,731 Algerians set for deportation between July and January 2021 were returned.
