The Criminal Court of Seine-Saint-Denis has sentenced three police officers implicated in the assault of Theo Luhaka during his 2017 arrest to suspended imprisonment ranging from three months to one year, according to local news outlet BFMTV.

The main assailant officer Marc-Antoine Castelain was charged with voluntary violence leading to “a mutilation or permanent infirmity,” with his status as public authority being considered as an aggravating fact. He was found guilty of voluntary violence, but there was not enough evidence of a permanent infirmity caused by the blow inflicted by the baton. As a result, he received a one year suspended jail sentence, with a five-year ban to exercise his functions as public police and on carrying a weapon.

The two other officers were charged with voluntary violence. They each received a suspended three months jail sentence.

The case of Luhaka has opened a debate in France regarding police violence, mainly against Black and Arab people, and has since become a symbol of the struggle against it. In February 2017, Lukhaka was subjected to hard blows by the officers while conducting an ID-verification operation on a group of young men, which has left Luhaka with “a permanent handicap.”

In a separate 2016 incident, Adama Traoré allegedly died of asphyxiation under police custody which has led to violent clashes in Paris. The debate around police violence in the country intensified when 17-year-old North-African descent Nahel Merzouk was fatally shot in June 2023, sparking violent protests in Nanterre.