Moroccan court hands 20-year jail term to rapist of deceased teenager

One of the attackers of a deceased Moroccan teenager who was gang raped and threatened with blackmail, was sentenced on Wednesday to 20 years in prison.

A court in the town of Marrakech handed down the sentence to the unnamed convict was found guilty of charges including statutory rape and violence, Omar Arbib, representative of the Moroccan Association for Human Rights told the AFP.

The 17-year-old deceased, Souidi Khadija, suffered the gang rape in late 2015. The assailants conditionally released her shortly after, then threatened to broadcast the sex scene on the internet after filming the session using a mobile phone.

The girl finally set herself on fire in the street of her hometown of Ben Guerir and died shortly after. Her death led to an outpouring of emotion and condemnation across the country.

The court in charge of the criminal aspect of the case, postponed sitting to August 29 for its decision on six other defendants, a source at the Moroccan justice department noted.