sentenced<\/a> to seven years in prison in November 2025 after being convicted of forming a criminal gang, attempting to kidnap and detain someone, and inciting others to commit crimes.<\/p>\nThe appeals court overturned the conviction on the charge of forming a criminal gang, leading to a significant reduction in his prison term. It also revised the sentences of several other defendants involved in the case, according to the reports.<\/p>\n
The decision could allow Maes to leave prison, as he has already spent nearly 22 months in detention since his arrest in January 2025. However, his release would depend on whether he faces any other outstanding legal proceedings or detention orders.<\/p>\n
According to local media reports, the case involved allegations that the rapper had arranged for a group of men, including individuals described as hired killers, to target a rival in Marrakech. The alleged plan was linked to a personal or financial dispute.<\/p>\n
Maes was arrested in Morocco in January 2025 after arriving from the United Arab Emirates. He had reportedly been living in Dubai before his arrest.<\/p>\n
During the proceedings, the rapper denied the accusations, saying he did not know the other defendants and had no connection to them.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The original ruling, delivered in November 2025, also handed down prison sentences to several co-defendants. The appeals court reduced some of those terms, including the sentences of two defendants from 10 and seven years to four years each.<\/p>\n
The court also acquitted one defendant and overturned the criminal gang conviction against six individuals, including Maes.<\/p>\n
Separate French case<\/p>\n
The Moroccan proceedings came as Maes also faced legal issues in France. In June 2024, a French court sentenced him in his absence to 10 months in prison and a \u20ac10,000 fine over group violence dating back to 2018.<\/p>\n
The French case was separate from the Marrakech kidnapping allegations.<\/p>\n
Born in 1995, Maes rose to prominence in French-speaking rap with several successful releases, building a large audience through streaming platforms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rabat \u2013 A Moroccan court has reduced the prison sentence of French-Moroccan rapper Maes from seven years to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":677837,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[93,61,60,8763,287036,278,287037],"class_list":["post-677836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-kidnapping","tag-maes-arrest","tag-music","tag-rapper-maes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/677836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=677836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/677836\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/677837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=677836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=677836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=677836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}