At the Assize Court of Paris,
33° in the capital. Stifling heat. The tiny windows overlooking the Salle Voltaire have been opened. Two white fans were hastily installed in front of the public bench, three more behind the jurors and magistrates, another in the dock. A few people in the room, which is packed, are waving fans. Chanel black t-shirt, jeans and sneakers, MHD – who appeared free – is seated on a chair, facing the court which is trying him for the murder of a 23-year-old young man in July 2018.
At the start of the afternoon, the rapper listens with arms crossed to the personality investigator who has been responsible for “retracing his life course” and “identifying elements of his personality”. During their interview, which took place during his stay in the prison of Health, he was “cooperative” but showed a “certain modesty” about his love life.
She also met several members of her entourage: her mother, her girlfriend, her producer… Her career is “smooth, without any particular event apart from her artistic career and her notoriety which, according to her entourage, did not take her away from her values”, sums up the personality investigator.
A teenager “calm, shy, without any particular problem”
The rapper was born in La Roche-sur-Yon, in Vendée, but spent part of his childhood in the 19th arrondissement of Paris with his parents, two brothers and two sisters. A family described as “united, welded, joyful”. “He grew up in a caring environment, he speaks of a beautiful childhood,” she continues. As a teenager, Mohamed Sylla was “calm, shy, without any particular problem”, “quite a homebody”. He was a “rather serious student with decent results”. He obtained a BEP cuisine in 2012 and worked for three years “for various fast food brands”. At the time, he earned between 900 and 1,900 euros per month.
The young man has “always had an interest in music”. But it was in 2015 that he made himself known by posting one of his compositions on social networks. The video is viewed several thousand times in a few days. He “launches professionally in song”, signs a contract with a record company, releases a first album in 2016 which is “an international success”.
In 2018, he “multiplied artistic projects”, left his city to settle in the very chic town of Neuilly-sur-Seine (Hauts-de-Seine), passed his driving license and “offered a Mercedes” thanks to his “very comfortable income”: in 2022, he earned around one million euros. He also bought a hairdressing salon, whose manager is his older brother. He also helped his youngest brother find a job. On the other hand, he did not discuss the facts with the investigator, only suggesting that he denied them.
“In six months, his life has completely changed”
It is then the turn of his producer to take the stand. Beige polo shirt, black pants, bald head, metallic glasses, thin beard, Adel Kaddar discovered his nugget in 2015 while working at Warner Chappell Music France. He immediately found MHD’s productions “great”. “He had mixed African music with urban music, which wasn’t done much,” he explains. The rapper invented a style: the Afrotrap. “It was something very new, very original, which was unlike anything else,” describes the witness.
Its success was dazzling. “In six months, his life has completely changed, he has gone from pizza delivery boy to international star. Mohamed Sylla then goes on tours, concerts, collaborations with brands. “In 2018, we did more than 200 dates, we had to spend only 30 or 40 days in Paris. MHD even asked four friends from the neighborhood to accompany him.
When he was travelling, he recalls, MHD “lent his car a lot, it was a subject of discord between us”. Adel Kaddar had every intention of “developing” the career of his protege. She experienced a setback with her arrest. “We were going to go on an international tour the day he was arrested,” he breathes. The planned concert in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, in a hall of 6,000 people, was canceled at the last moment. Clip, film, new album… “At that time, we put everything on stand-by”, insists the one who calls himself his “close friend”. Since then, the rapper has released “an album, Mansa, a year and a half ago, and three new titles last month”. “He needs to work, he can’t sit around doing nothing. On the other hand, he cannot go on tour abroad when he is overwhelmed with proposals, regrets his producer.
“A problem with his car”
“You rubbed shoulders with him between the facts and his arrest. Do you remember a detail? asks MHD’s lawyer, Me Elise Arfi. According to Adel Kaddar, the rapper was in Germany when he learned of the death of Loïc Kamtchouang and the discovery of his charred Mercedes in a parking lot in the 19th arrondissement. “He told me there had been a problem with his car, I told him to call you immediately”.
One of the two lawyers for the civil party, Me Mathilde Robert, observes for her part, that he had announced on Snapchat that he wanted to end his career, three days before the release of his second album, in September 2018. C that is to say a few weeks after the fact. Should there be a link? His producer, Adel Kaddar, assures that the young man was simply burning out, like many overworked artists.
Shortly after 6 p.m., Mohamed Sylla was called to the bar. The president asks him about the name given to his group of friends, the “Moula gang”. “It started from a very stupid delirium, it was just a name given to me and others to distinguish themselves from the people of the city”, replies the young man, specifying that it is a “reference to one of his first pieces. He approached these friends of the district, which is “a small village”, “the year of my success”. “When I asked for participants for my clips, they answered present, without remuneration. »
MHD assures him: his budding celebrity has changed nothing with “none” of them. The magistrate then questions him about his style of dress, his passion for cars. She finally asks him how he sees his future. “It’s hard to project myself, I think more about what’s happening now than what I could do later in music. »
“A course that you have smoothed”
After his release in 2020, he waited a year “before releasing a song, the time to find [s] are landmarks”. The detention, he acknowledges, was “a shock”. “I spent five or six months without seeing anyone, I felt very alone, very isolated,” says Mohamed Sylla. Since then, he separated from his former spouse, met another woman. “I had a child three months ago with this girl,” explains the artist.
The Advocate General reminds him that “there was an attempted murder of your brother in 2016, it is not completely uninteresting in the context that interests us today”. Would he have wanted revenge in July 2018? The magistrate is surprised in any case that the rapper does not speak more about this event. “The Personality Investigator describes your journey as smooth. I rather have the impression that you are presenting yourself with a course that you have smoothed out. »