Marrakech – A French appeals court handed Moroccan singer Saad Lamjarred a 10-year prison term for rape on Saturday, increasing the sentence he received at his first trial.
The cour d’assises d’appel du Val-de-Marne, sitting in Créteil, convicted the 41-year-old artist of aggravated rape, with the aggravating factor tied to his intoxicated state, and ordered his immediate imprisonment.
The parquet général had requested eight years, according to AFP. The Paris cour d’assises had convicted Lamjarred in 2023 and sentenced him to six years in the same case.
The verdict closed eight days of hearings that opened on September 17. The court held the appeal trial behind closed doors at the request of the civil party. Judges had postponed the proceedings in June 2025 to allow further investigation.
Jurors found Lamjarred guilty of raping Laura Prioul in a Paris hotel room in October 2016. He was 31 at the time, and she was 20. The two had met at a Parisian nightclub before the assault.
Lamjarred appeared free under judicial supervision and contested the charge throughout. He denied any sexual relationship with Prioul. He acknowledged only that he had “brutally pushed” her in the face, telling the court she had scratched him while they were kissing.
One of Prioul’s two lawyers, David Chemmi, linked the heavier sentence to the defense’s conduct. “This sentence seems to me to be explained notably by the worrying profile of the accused, but also by the particularly aggressive strategy adopted” toward the complainant, he told AFP.
Chemmi argued that the defense had damaged its own position before the jury. The “systematic questioning of her word,” together with “attacks directed against the investigators and the experts,” were “clearly badly perceived by the jurors,” he added. “One can defend an accused with determination, but one cannot do so by denying or scorning the victim.”
The defense signaled it would fight on. Marie Burguburu, one of Lamjarred’s lawyers, told AFP that the team would file an appeal before the Court of Cassation, and she maintained his innocence.
The case carried a separate extortion dimension. In April, a court convicted five people of attempting to extort Lamjarred, after they demanded three million euros for Prioul to withdraw her complaint and stay away from the assizes. The court acquitted Prioul herself, finding no evidence that she intended to reverse her statements to secure an acquittal.
The convicted included Prioul’s mother, a lawyer, an influencer, and two others. They received suspended sentences ranging from six months to two years.
Lamjarred faces further legal exposure. In May, the cour d’assises du Var, in Draguignan, sentenced him to five years for the rape of a young woman near Saint-Tropez in 2018, and he has appealed that decision.
Authorities had also linked him to similar cases earlier in his career. He faced accusations in Morocco in 2015 and in the United States in 2010, where prosecutors dropped a rape and sexual assault case after a financial settlement with the victim.
Lamjarred remains among the most-followed Arab artists online, with more than 15 million Instagram followers and nearly 16 million subscribers on YouTube.
