Dahbia Benkired, a 27-year-old Algerian national, has been sentenced to a rare whole-life sentence for the brutal rape and murder of 12-year-old Lola Daviet, a case that has horrified France.
This is the country’s most severe punishment, and Benkired is the first woman ever to receive it. The decision was delivered by a panel of 3 judges and a 6-member jury.
The court heard how in October 2022, Benkired lured Lola into a Paris apartment, subjected her to a sexual assault, and killed her by asphyxiation using duct tape. The presiding judge described the acts as displaying “extreme cruelty” and “true torture.”
Following the verdict, Lola’s mother, Delphine Daviet, stated, “We believed in justice and we got it.”
The case drew political attention as Benkired was in France illegally after overstaying her student visa. Far-right politicians seized on the event, prompting criticism from France’s justice minister and a statement from Lola’s parents denouncing the “use of the name and image of [our] child for political ends.”
Since the introduction of this maximum punishment in 1994, only 4 men in France have received this penalty to date. For the first time, a woman has now been added to that list.
