Almost eight years after the terrorist attack in the French Mediterranean city of Nice that left 86 people dead, two of the attacker's helpers were sentenced to 18 years in prison in an appeal trial in Paris.
On Thursday evening, the court found the two men guilty of membership of a terrorist organization and imposed the same sentence as the first instance, the Le Parisien newspaer reported from the courtroom.
Among the 86 victims of the suspected Islamist-motivated lorry attack were two schoolgirls and a teacher from the Paula Fürst School in Berlin, who were on a sixth form trip to the southern French city.
The two men were accused of providing moral and material support to the attacker and of inspiring him.
According to the public prosecutor's office, they knew about the man's mindset and that he was capable of committing an attack. They are also said to have been involved in the search for a firearm.
In the original trial, six other helpers of the assassin were sentenced to between two and 12 years in prison at the end of 2022. Unlike the two main defendants at the time, they did not appeal.
On July 14, 2016, on a French bank holiday, Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, a Tunisian national, drove a lorry weighing several tonnes into a crowd of people on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice shortly after the fireworks display. He also shot at people. In the end, 86 people were killed and more than 200 injured. The perpetrator was shot dead after the attack.
The terrorist militia Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility for the attack.
According to the authorities, this alleged claim was opportunistic despite the perpetrator's interest in jihadism. No connection between the perpetrator and a terrorist organization was found, but a clear Islamist inspiration was.
At the time, the attack shook France, which had already been hit to the core by the terrorist attacks on the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and a Jewish supermarket, as well as on restaurants and the Bataclan concert hall in Paris.
Suspected security shortcomings in Nice at the time of the attack may still be the subject of legal proceedings.
As the public prosecutor's office in Nice announced at the beginning of the year, the investigation into negligent homicide and assault is being taken over by a specialised department of the public prosecutor's office in Marseille.
Those affected are still wondering why the perpetrator was able to drive onto the promenade and whether there were enough police on duty on the evening of the bank holidays.