PARIS – A French court on Thursday handed a 10-month suspended sentence toa sister of the Saudi crown prince over the beating of a workman at aluxury residence in Paris in 2016.
Hassa bint Salman, a daughter of King Salman and sister of the powerfulCrown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, had been charged with instructing herbodyguard to beat up a plumber.
Tried in absentia and the target of an arrest warrant since December 2017,she was also ordered by the Paris court to pay a 10,000-euro ($11,000) fine.
The princess, 42, had never shown up at the trial, which got underway inJuly.
The punishment was heavier than demanded by prosecutors, who had sought asix-month suspended sentence and a fine of 5,000 euros ($5,480).
The princess, whose brother is known by his initials MBS and is seen as thekingdom’s de facto ruler, was accused of instructing her bodyguard RaniSaidi to beat up Ashraf Eid after he was seen taking pictures inside herhome in September 2016.
She had been charged with complicity in an act of intentional violence,complicity in illegal confinement and complicity in theft.
Saidi, who was the only protagonist in the case present in court, washanded an eight-month suspended sentence and a 5,000-euro fine, in linewith the recommendations of prosecutors.
Eid was working on the seventh floor of the luxury apartment block owned bythe Saudi royals on Avenue Foch, a favourite destination of foreignmillionaires in Paris, when he was called to the fifth floor to repair adamaged wash basin.
Read Top Stories
He took pictures of the bathroom which he told investigators he needed tocarry out his work.
Eid claims that the princess flew into a rage after he caught herreflection in a mirror on camera. She called in her bodyguard, whoallegedly beat him.
Eid claimed he was also tied up and ordered to kiss the feet of theprincess, who is lionised in the Saudi state-run media for her charity workand women’s rights campaigning.
The plumber claimed that he was allowed to leave the apartment only afterseveral hours, during which his phone was destroyed, and that at one pointthe princess shouted: “Kill him, the dog, he doesn’t deserve to live.”
The case is the latest blow to the image of the kingdom, where PrinceMohammed sparked hopes of major social and economic reform when he waselevated to crown prince in 2017.
But his reputation was badly damaged by the murder of dissident writerJamal Khashoggi at Saudi Arabia’s consulate in Istanbul last year, and heis also seen as the driving force in the Saudi military intervention inYemen, where tens of thousands have died. -APP/AFP
