Jewish Museum murder suspect ‘too sick’ to attend court

Summary

The lawyers representing Jewish Museum of Belgium shooting suspect Mehdi Nemmouche say that he might have a tumour and is not receiving medical care

Four killed in 2014 attack

Mehdi Nemmouche, the man accused of carrying out the shooting death of four people at the Jewish Museum in Brussels in 2014, did not appear at a committal hearing this week because of health problems, his lawyers said.

“Nemmouche is suffering from terrible pain and is sometimes unable to see or hear,” said lawyers Sébastien Courtoy and Henri Laquay in a statement. The problem, they said “could be caused by a tumour.” According to his counsel, the accused is not being properly treated by prison authorities.

Nemmouche is accused of carrying out the shooting attack on the Jewish Museum. An Israeli couple visiting the museum and a museum volunteer were pronounced dead at the scene, while another museum employee died later in hospital.

Nemmouche was identified from CCTV footage and later arrested by French police in Marseilles in possession of firearms, ammunition and an IS flag. His lawyers maintain that he was involved in the attack but did not carry it out personally.
Photo: Mehdi Nemmouche’s lawyers speak to the press at the courthouse in Brussels
©Dirk Waem/BELGA

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1 comment
George PelkaIndeed, justice has got strange roads: when I did not show up for an accident hearing (even though the police claimed responsibility to the other side) I got punished by a fine and insurance malus. When a racist, extremist, mass murderer and terrorist, an "enemy of the state and general public", does not show up at the hearing, he gets a celebrity treatment on the front page. My oh my, in such a case I wish we were in China (or in India, where - as my Indian colleague stated some time ago - he would not survive the treatment in the police van)...

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