It was at dawn, on October 3, 2016, when two hooded men entered the luxury apartment room of Kim Kardashian in the central and elegant neighborhood of La Madeleine in Paris, where the influencer and businesswoman stayed during the French capital week. Three stayed in La Plata low. They gagged her, immobilized her by looking at her hands with plastic cables and adhesive tape and devalued her. Nine years after the spectacular and millionaire robbery, this Monday, April 28, the trial in Paris has started the dozen of those involved in the assault, known as the “grandparents thieves”, because then they were sexagenarians.
They are 12 involved, but they will appear only a dozen (nine men and one woman), because one of the leaders, with Alzheimer’s, will not be able to do it due to their state of health and another died last March. Five of them, all men, face armed robbery and kidnapping charges, and can be sentenced to life imprisonment; The others are accused of complicity in the unauthorized robbery or possession of a weapon. The so -called “Rue Tronchet trial” (the street where Poultalès was, which is not a hotel to use; it is completely rented or by plants, according to the preference of the guests) will last for three weeks and it is planned that Kardashian trips to Paris to declare on May 13. A person who has been in decades in France is considered the greatest robbery.
On the first day of judgment, which is held in the Voltaire Room, one of the largest solera of the historic Palace of Justice of Paris, the defendants have spoken one after another in the Chamber of the Court of Paris to confirm their identity and occupation; And many of them, who are now around seventy, said they were retired.
Kardashian, who was then 35 years old, was in Paris to attend the French catwalk parades. He always stayed at a discreet hotel, baptized as the non -adress for his discretion. The coup was sounded, not only because of her visibility, but for the modus operandi of the thieves, old school, from the beginning of the robbery to the end. There were five, they entered easily, disguised as police, they handcuffed the receptionist – who today has come to the trial – and forced him to lead them to the room. “The rapper’s woman,” they said. At that time, Kardashian was married to Kanye West, who was divorced in 2022.
Two climbed and the other three were watching down. Already inside the room, at gunpoint, Kardashian was immobilized and gagged in his bed, and then, when they already took the loot, he was locked in the bathroom. One of the assailants shouted “ring, ring”He referred to the diamond alliance that his then partner had given her, and that she herself had looked and shown in her social networks on numerous occasions. Only the ring was valued at four million dollars. They stole other jewels that she carried with them, including bracelets, earrings and a clock. The estimated value of the blow: about 10 million dollars.
The other three accomplices waited in the lobby to facilitate flight. They escaped by bicycle. During their leak they left all types of trace: DNA traces, remains of the adhesive tape and even lost a necklace, part of the loot. The agents of the crime repression brigade (BRB) arrived in the room around three in the morning and found the actress in a state of “total terror.” “I thought I was going to die,” she recalled in several later interviews.
The police identified, three months later, the assailants, as their DNA was found in the tapes to amordaza and, being signed, they were easily located. From there they pulled the thread and finally stopped 17 people. One of those involved was looking for and capturing since 2010, after having been sentenced by drug trafficking. He used a false identity, but his name was Aomar Aït Khedache, aka The old man. With 69 years – he will comply with the 70s at the end of this week – the researchers consider him the brain of the plan, something he denies.
He did admit to having assaulted Kardashian’s room, although without knowing who she was exactly. An “informant” gave him the details to make an “easy blow.” From Chivato in Chivato, including Kardashian’s driver in Paris – who was also arrested -, he learned the details, place and dates. “It wasn’t violent, it was simple. It was not a great robbery,” he told the researchers.
Frank Berton, his lawyer, said Monday that he expected that the fact that Kardashian is a world star does not affect the trial, in which 400 journalists are accredited: “This trial attracts international attention for whom the plaintiff is, the victim. What we expect is that it does not change anything in the way in which the facts are judged.”
The rest of the involved were located thanks to the analysis of the security cameras, those of the place of the events and those in the street, and the analysis of the telephone of the involved. Another of them, who was allegedly in charge of selling the jewels in Belgium, died in prison last March – this Monday, the president of the Criminal Court of Paris also formalized the extinction of the judicial action against him. The jewels disappeared.
Of the 17 detainees – which were initially imprisoned, although after a period of preventive detention they were released under judicial control – finally 12 were charged, but they will only appear before the judges a dozen. Those present, despite their advanced age, will face the megainfluencer and businesswoman, who has 357 million followers on social networks. Some have hearing problems, so all statements will be transcribed in the viewing room, open to the public.
One of those who will attend the trial is Yunice Abbas, today 71, who has spent a third of his life in prison for other crimes, and was one of those involved who guarded in the hall And he fled by bicycle, with the “police” vest on his back, he has counted. Abbas, in any case, has not missed the opportunity to take a slice out of his last blow, and published a book entitled I kidnapped Kim Kardashian. In the brief, he made fun of the celebrity – he continued that she tried to call 911, which is the number of emergencies in the United States but not in Europe – but also explained that he sent a letter of apology to Kardashian from jail after realizing the “psychological damage inflicted” and asking for “a little indulgence.”
