French trial scheduled to last nine months, with about 1,800 plaintiffs in what is described as an unprecedented judicial marathon.
A trial of unprecedented scale starts in France under high security over the November 2015 attacks in Paris that were the deadliest in peacetime France.
Some 130 people were killed and hundreds wounded when gunmen with suicide vests attacked six bars and restaurants, the Bataclan concert hall, and a sports stadium, leaving deep scars on the nation’s psyche.
Jean-Pierre Albertini, whose 39-year-old son, Stephane, was killed in the Bataclan concert hall, told the Reuters news agency, “That night plunged us all into horror and ugliness.”
On Wednesday, twenty men will go on trial. With police on high alert, streets near the Palais de Justice courthouse on an island in central Paris will be blocked to cars and pedestrians, with the surrounding banks of the Seine also off-limits.
Those authorised to attend the trial will have to go through multiple checkpoints before being allowed in a specially built court and other rooms where the hearings will be broadcast.
The trial is expected to last nine months, with about 1,800 plaintiffs and over 300 lawyers taking part in what Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti has termed as an unprecedented judicial marathon. The decision will be made in late May 2022.
The case file runs to a million pages in 542 volumes, measuring 53 metres (173.8 feet) across.
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