A French court on Friday sentenced a former high school student to 15 years in prison for the fatal stabbing of his Spanish teacher in 2023.
The defendant, now 19, had been charged with murdering Agnes Lassalle, 53, at a school in the southwestern seaside town of Saint-Jean-de-Luz.
After three hours of deliberation, judges at a juvenile criminal court handed down a sentence slightly below the 16 years sought by prosecutors and well under the maximum 20-year term he faced.
The court heard that Lassalle was stabbed in the chest during a lesson in February 2023. The student, who was 16 at the time, had reportedly locked the classroom door before attacking her with a kitchen knife he took from his father’s home.
The trial, conducted behind closed doors in Pau, centred on the teenager’s mental state, with psychiatric experts presenting differing assessments.
Judges ruled that his judgment was impaired at the time of the attack — a finding that could have reduced the sentence to 13 years — but concluded that a longer prison term was warranted due to what they described as the “undeniable seriousness” of the crime.
Lassalle’s killing sparked widespread outrage across France, intensified by emotional scenes at her funeral, including images of her partner dancing alone beside her coffin.
