France: Muslim migrant with previous convictions for knife attacks stabs random man to death on the street

We have seen random stabbings by jihadis in the West many times. The Islamic State issued this call in September 2014:

So O muwahhid, do not let this battle pass you by wherever you may be. You must strike the soldiers, patrons, and troops of the tawaghit. Strike their police, security, and intelligence members, as well as their treacherous agents. Destroy their beds. Embitter their lives for them and busy them with themselves. If you can kill a disbelieving American or European — especially the spiteful and filthy French — or an Australian, or a Canadian, or any other disbeliever from the disbelievers waging war, including the citizens of the countries that entered into a coalition against the Islamic State, then rely upon Allah, and kill him in any manner or way however it may be….If you are not able to find an IED or a bullet, then single out the disbelieving American, Frenchman, or any of their allies. Smash his head with a rock, or slaughter him with a knife, or run him over with your car, or throw him down from a high place, or choke him, or poison him….

Might that have anything to do with this incident? Possibly, but given the determination of the Western political and media elites to downplay and whitewash the jihad threat, we may never know for sure.

“The absurd death of Joaquim in Montpellier in court,” translated from “La mort absurde de Joaquim à Montpellier devant la justice,” by Sébastien Ramnoux, Le Parisien, February 7, 2021 (thanks to Mason):

The scene is incredibly violent, astounding in its suddenness. It was filmed on the evening of November 2, 2017 by the video surveillance of Carrefour City on rue Saint-Guilhem, in the center of Montpellier (Hérault). Under the cold and clinical eye of the camera, a man suddenly appears in the frame, runs towards two people in the street, grabs one of them and stabs him violently in the chest before fleeing. It is exactly 9:52 pm and 58 seconds, Joaquim Tougeron, 20, collapses, his heart fatally pierced. He was declared dead by the emergency services at 10:30 p.m.

How did we come to such a drama? This will be the subject of the debates which start this Monday before the Assize Court of Montpellier. Mohammed Guendouz is tried there for assassination. This is the thesis of the prosecution: this man, now 32 years old, premeditated his act. He denies this, and assures us that he was only defending himself following an altercation with the victim.

Everything was done in ten minutes. Before the events, Joaquim Tougeron and Mohammed Guendouz did not know each other. The 20-year-old geography student had just moved to the neighborhood for his studies. Life promised to be happy for him. That night he wanted to show his girlfriend his apartment. At Carrefour City, an argument broke out between the two, who were described “as madly in love” by their relatives.

One of the blows hits the heart

Mohammed Guendouz, who lived in the neighborhood, intervened, the tone rose between the two men. Guendouz claims that the student hit him first, which the video, where he is seen hitting Joaquim with an object, seems to contradict. Several witnesses try to separate them, and finally each leaves on his own.

Ten minutes later, Mohammed Guendouz appears in the street where Joaquim had asked a passer-by to use his phone to call his girlfriend, and he stabs the student twice before running away. One of the two blows is struck with such violence that it pierces Joaquim’s chest and reaches his heart.

The investigation is rapid: the investigations establish that Mohammed Guendouz returned briefly to his home after the altercation, before coming out immediately to go, without shoes, to the Carrefour City which has just closed. He throws himself against the doors, then starts running and catches up with Joaquim. Guendouz claims that he stabbed the young man because he had just assaulted him. A version completely denied by the video, and also by the various testimonies. Despite these overwhelming elements, the murderer maintains his story. From the looks of things, Guendouz premeditated his gesture, went back to his apartment to take a knife, and deliberately attacked the young man.

Already several convictions for knife attacks

“The family is devastated, the trial will be a difficult time for them,” explains Luc Abratkiewicz, who defends Joaquim’s relatives. They have the courage to come and testify for their child, and also to understand how the one who killed him could have come to this. At the time of the facts, Mohammed Guendouz was not unknown to the courts. His record shows six convictions between 2010 and 2015, several for knife attacks.

At one time he was indicted for attempted murder in Hauts-de-Seine. He was finally sentenced to two years in prison for violence with weapons. In Montpellier, he was also sentenced in 2015 for having stabbed two people in the street. There again, despite elements of video surveillance, he had denied being in possession of a weapon and claimed that it was he who had been assaulted. Psychological expertise describes a man who is “irritable, impulsive.” “A violence that is out of his control, which makes him dangerous for others.”…

Mr. Jacques Martin, lawyer with a long criminal career and former president of the bar, agreed to urgently take up the defense of the alleged murderer. Obviously, there is no question of denying the stabbing. “It will also be the trial of indifference, and of disruptions, those that have marked the course of Mr. Guendouz. He was forced by his family to come to France from the Aurès in Algeria, it was the tragedy of his life. He did not speak French when he arrived. Yet he had managed to start a family, have a child before being rejected. Another breakup,” the lawyer says….