Documentary record Bound by Fear
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Conviction Islamic institutions and contexts Ruqya, shrine, and healing contexts Seine-Saint-Denis, France · 2024

France: self-styled marabout given the maximum 15 years for raping nine women under a jinn-healing pretext

Record class

Core record

Evidence status

Convicted

Authority role

self-styled marabout claiming healing and jinn-removal powers

Organization

No organization assigned

Spiritual nexus

Sidibé's claimed power to heal sick children and expel djinns is what led vulnerable women to seek him out and follow him into an isolated hotel room for ritual treatment — the spiritual-healing pretext was the entire mechanism of access.

  • Spiritual healing or treatment
  • Curse or witchcraft threat
  • Prosperity, divination, or curse-removal claim

Evidence structure

Proceedings

  1. 2024-05-06 · trial conviction and sentence

    Seine-Saint-Denis criminal court (cour criminelle), France. Ali Sidibé, a Malian migrant in his thirties who presented himself as a marabout able to heal sick children and remove djinns, was found guilty of raping nine women from the West African diaspora in the Paris region between 2018 and 2020, and of defrauding those and roughly fifteen further victims of tens of thousands of euros. He was sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment, the maximum available.

Documented coercion mechanisms

  • claimed ability to heal sick children and remove djinns (evil spirits)
  • exploitation of victims' religious and spiritual beliefs
  • isolation of victims in a hotel room under the guise of ritual treatment
  • financial fraud accompanying the spiritual pretext

Primary record

Sources

national newspaper court reporting sentencing report Le Matin, 'France: un marabout violeur en série écope de 15 ans de prison' [France: serial-rapist marabout gets 15 years in prison] (6 May 2024).

Reports Sidibé's claimed healing and djinn-removal powers, his exploitation of victims' religious beliefs to lure them to a hotel room, the nine rape convictions, the fraud convictions against roughly fifteen further victims, and the maximum 15-year sentence.

national newspaper court reporting sentencing report Fdesouche, coverage of the Seine-Saint-Denis criminal-court verdict against 'Ali S.' (6 May 2024).

Independent corroboration of the nine rape convictions, the fraud victims, and the maximum 15-year sentence.

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