Moroccan singer Saad Lamjarred has been found guilty of raping a young lady in a Paris hotel in 2016 and sentenced to six years in prison.
Lamjarred was immediately detained and showed no reaction after the verdict was announced by a court in Paris on Friday.
Famous in the Arab music world, Lamjarred’s hit LM3ALLEM has been viewed more than one billion times on YouTube.
In 2016, Lamjarred was apprehended and the king of Morocco, who had previously bestowed the country’s most esteemed national honour upon the singer, intervened to finance his legal expenses.
At the time of the trial, many of the singer’s supporters claimed that he was the target of a “plot” perpetrated by neighbouring Algeria, with whom Morocco’s relationship is strained.
Furthermore, Lamjarred’s first song, which he devoted to the king after his detention, demonstrated his continued popularity, amassing more than 140 million views. It remains unclear if he intends to contest the ruling.