Real Madrid forward Kylian Mbappé was listed as one of the main targets to be kidnapped by a dangerous French gang led by an 18-year-old under the pseudonym Lester Z.
This was reported by the prestigious French newspaper Le Parisien.
According to the paper, the actual name of the lynchpin of the plot was Clément L., a Franco-Swiss citizen, who is serving time in prison for armed robbery and pimping.
From prison, it was discovered, he was planning to kidnap 26 people: footballers, rappers and wealthy businessmen.
He was identified after the assault on a watchmaker last April in Neuilly-sur-Seine, an urban suburb to the immediate west of Paris, the French capital.
From his cell in the Villepinte penitentiary of Seine-Saint-Denis, the young man gave orders to his foot soldiers via Snapchat using the pseudonym ‘Lester Z’.
When the gang was busted, from his two phones, the addresses of singers, footballers and businessmen were extracted, all of them persons with great wealth.
Among them are a Chinese wholesaler, jewelers, and a Turkish meat wholesaler in Val-d”Oise, whose fortune is estimated in the millions.
The paper reported that there was also an incomparably richer target, Mbappe, on the phones.
“He also wanted to target a rapper and footballer Kylian Mbappé,” Le Parisien quoted a judicial source as saying.
When questioned, the young man, who dropped out of school in his first year of vocational training in cooking, said that he hoped to resume his studies and become a chef.
*PHOTO CAPTION: Mbappe (l) relaxing with a former teammate Achraf Hakimi.
