A French court on Friday sentenced the Algerian singer Cheb Mami, above, to five years in jail for abducting a former lover and trying to force her to have an abortion Cheb Mami, 42, whose real name is Mohammed Khelifati, is one of the biggest stars of rai music, an Algerian pop style, and has recorded with Sting.
Prosecutors at the court in Bobigny, near Paris, said he was one of a group of men who in 2005 abducted, drugged and beat the woman, a 43-year-old French photographer, and tried to perform an abortion on her at a villa in Algiers after she revealed that she was pregnant with the singer’s child.
The woman, whose name was withheld, returned to Paris and found she was still pregnant; she gave birth to a daughter, who is now 3. Cheb Mami blamed his former manager, Michel Lecorre, who he said was behind the plot. “I did nothing to stop him,” the singer said. Mr. Lecorre was sentenced to four years. Two other men were convicted in absentia of involvement in the case.
