French court jails ‘Tinder rapist’ photographer for 18 years

A French court on Friday jailed a man for 18 years for raping and sexually assaulting several women he had lured on dating apps and social media to take their picture.

Published: 30 March 2024 07:17 CET

This illustration picture shows the logo of the US social networking application Tinder on the screen of a tablet. A French court on Friday jailed a man for raping and sexually assaulting numerous women he had lured using the dating application Tinder. (Photo by Martin BUREAU / AFP)

Salim Berrada, a 38-year-old former photographer from Morocco, was found guilty of 12 rapes and three sexual assaults and will be obliged to leave France in the “Tinder rapist” case, named after the popular dating app.

He was charged with raping or sexually assaulting 17 women, but he was acquitted of rape for two alleged victims because of a lack of evidence and the benefit of the doubt.

Berrada remained emotionless as the verdict was read out while his victims were heard breathing sighs of relief as the presiding judge read out their names one by one.

When the hearing was declared over, several of the women stood up to applaud, shout “thank you” and hug each other after the two-week trial.

‘Extremely dangerous’

Prosecutors had requested 19 years’ jail for Berrada, saying he invited women he met online in 2015 and 2016 to modelling photo shoots and assaulted them during the encounters, most after spiking their drink.

The defendant had denied the charges, saying the sexual relations were all consensual.

The prosecutor on Thursday argued that Berrada was “addicted to sex and preying” on women, had a “very well-established, sly and compulsive modus operandi” and was “extremely dangerous”.

The investigation found that he followed a list of pick-up lines and compliments he had in an Excel spreadsheet, reaching out to potential victims
“en masse”.

When women arrived for a modelling session, Berrada offered them a drink, prosecutors said.

Once they accepted, the women said they felt an abnormal and rapid inebriation and sudden weakness, which investigators said pointed to the
drinks being laced with drugs.

The women then described a sudden change in Berrada’s attitude, and said he forced himself on them despite their objections.

The prosecutor cited one accuser as saying she “cried from beginning to end”.

The defendant told the trial some of his accusers had convinced themselves that he was a rapist, some had “lied”, and others might have led him to think they were consenting “because they said ‘yes’ to put on a brave face”.

His lawyers say toxicology reports did not prove he spiked any drinks, and some of the women he met later sent him messages saying they looked forward to seeing him again.

The prosecutor said Berrada was especially dangerous because he was a repeat offender.

Berrada was first arrested in 2016 and spent two and a half years in prison awaiting trial before being released under judicial supervision and banned from working as a photographer.

He was jailed again in July following a fresh wave of legal complaints, and again charged with rape and sexual assault.

The investigation into the new allegations is ongoing.

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The French Jewish community, the third largest in the world, has for months been on edge in the face of a growing number of attacks and desecrations of memorials.

“National police in Rouen neutralised early this morning an armed individual who clearly wanted to set fire to the city’s synagogue,” Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Police responded at 6.45 am to reports of “fire near the synagogue”, a police source said.

A source close to the case told AFP the man “was armed with a knife and an iron bar, he approached police, who fired. The individual died”.

“It is not only the Jewish community that is affected. It is the entire city of Rouen that is bruised and in shock,” Rouen Mayor Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol wrote on X.

He made clear there were no other victims other than the attacker.

Two separate investigations have been opened, one into the fire at the synagogue and another into the circumstances of the death of the individual killed by the police, Rouen prosecutors said.

Such an investigation by France’s police inspectorate general is automatic whenever an individual is killed by the police.

The man threatened a police officer with a knife and the latter used his service weapon, said the Rouen prosecutor.

The dead man was not immediately identified, a police source said.

Asked by AFP, the National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office said that it is currently assessing whether it will take up the case.

France has the largest Jewish community of any country after Israel and the United States, as well as Europe’s largest Muslim community.

There have been tensions in France in the wake of the October 7th attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel, followed by the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip.

Red hand graffiti was painted onto France’s Holocaust Memorial earlier this week, prompted anger including from President Emmanuel Macron who condemned “odious anti-Semitism”.

“Attempting to burn a synagogue is an attempt to intimidate all Jews. Once again, there is an attempt to impose a climate of terror on the Jews of our country. Combating anti-Semitism means defending the Republic,” Yonathan Arfi, the president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF). wrote on X.

France was hit from 2015 by a spate of Islamist attacks that also hit Jewish targets. There have been isolated attacks in recent months and France’s security alert remains at its highest level.