Lawyer for convicted Paris attacker questions harsh sentence

By NICOLAS VAUX-MONTAGNY, JEFFREY SCHAEFFER and BARBARA SURK
Associated Press

PARIS (AP) — The lawyer for the only surviving attacker from the November 2015 terrorist massacre in Paris has criticized her client’s murder conviction and life prison sentence without the possibility of parole. Salah Abdeslam, the chief suspect in the Islamic State attacks on a theater, cafes and France’s national stadium that killed 130 people, was found guilty Wednesday of murder and attempted murder in relation with a terrorist enterprise, among other charges. His lawyer, Olivia Ronen, argued throughout the marathon trial that her client hadn’t detonated his explosives-packed vest or killed anyone on the night of the attacks. Ronen said in a radio interview Thursday that the 32-year-old receiving the most severe murder sentence possible “raises serious questions.”