The French state was ordered by an administrative court to pay compensation to the “beast of the Bataclan” Salah Abdeslam over the terrorist’s prison conditions.
The Administrative Court of Versailles ruled in 2017 that the prison surveillance of the sole survivor of the 2015 Bataclan massacre had been unlawful, claiming the constant 24-hour video cameras in his cell were a violation of Abdeslam’s privacy, Le Figaro reports.
The revelation comes in a new book released by French journalist Elsa Vigouroux, entitled The Journal of Frank Berton. Abdeslam is said not to have even discovered about the case until July of 2018, over a year after the ruling was made when Berton — a French lawyer who defended Abdeslam — asked for his bank details.
Ordering the French state to pay Abdeslam 500 euros, which the extremist later rejected, the court agreed with Berton that a ministerial order to observe the Islamic extremist “disregards Articles 34 and 37 of the Constitution, which have divided the respective powers of the legislative power and the regulatory power”.
Berton had previously made the claims in June 2016, stating that the 24-hour surveillance was “a serious misunderstanding of the right to respect for private life”, but his claims were rejected by the Administrative Court and the Council of State later that year.
Conservative politician Nicholas Dupont-Aignan commented on the compensation saying the ruling had been “shameful”.
Abdeslam survived the 2015 massacre which led to the deaths of 130 people in November 2015 but was captured months later in the heavily-migrant populated Brussels suburb of Molenbeek.
Last year, Abdeslam was found guilty of attempted murder in relation to his capture and sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Several months later, it was revealed that he routinely threatened and insulted prison workers at the Fleury-Mérogis prison, labelling guards as “infidels” and “dogs”.
Neighbouring Belgium has also been forced to compensate radical Islamist prisoners according to a report from earlier this year which involved complaints about segregated prison wings for radical Islamists.