A source familiar with the situation told AFP on Friday that French prosecutors are looking to charge 14 persons in connection with the beheading of a teacher by an Islamic extremist in 2020, a crime that shook France.
Two pals of the Chechen immigrant who murdered teacher Samuel Paty after showing his students photographs of the Prophet Mohammed have been charged with involvement in a terrorist murder.
The national prosecutor’s office has also suggested charges against six additional adults and six children in connection with the killing in the Paris suburb of Conflans-Sainte-Honorine.
Police shot and killed the murderer, Abdullakh Anzorov, 18, at the site.
Prosecutors believe his friends, Azim E. and Naim B., accompanied Anzorov to purchase a knife and Naim. A joined him on his way to school.
Investigating magistrates will make the final decision on whether to charge and prosecute the accused.
Paty was targeted when social media rumors spread that he had presented cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed from the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo to his pupils.
The 47-year-old history and geography instructor used the magazine as part of an ethics lecture to analyze France’s free speech regulations, which do not criminalize blasphemy.
Authorities have also recommended accusations of associating with terrorists against the father of Aaty’s school pupil, a radical Islamist preacher, and a Muslim convert who communicated with Anzorov via Twitter.
Paty has become a symbol of France’s struggle to preserve its stringent secular traditions, with President Emmanuel Macron referring to him as a “silent hero” of the republic.
