He is a Champions League winner and one of the tallest goalkeepers in world football, but on one terrifying night in Paris, Gianluigi Donnarumma could not protect his own home.

Two men involved in the brutal burglary of Manchester City goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma and his then pregnant girlfriend have been jailed by a Paris court, cbinews.tv reports.

Donnarumma was savagely beaten while his partner Alessia Elefante, now his wife, was choked with a phone charging cable. She later suffered a miscarriage that the court heard was linked to the trauma.

Mastermind Ilyas Kherbouch, 21, alias Ganito, was sentenced to nine years in prison and fined 80,000 euros. He had already made headlines for a brazen escape from Villepinte prison in March 2025. His co defendant Moktar D received five years, with two years suspended on probation. A third man Khyan M, 22, known as Kiki, who prosecutors claimed helped orchestrate the raid from his cell, was acquitted. A fourth suspect linked to the case died by suicide in Fresnes prison in 2024.

In the early hours of July 21, 2023, four masked men broke into Donnarumma’s luxury ninth floor flat on Avenue Montaigne via the rooftops. At the time the Italian, now 27, was playing for Paris Saint Germain. He moved to Manchester City in 2025.

The court heard the couple were dragged from bed, separated, bound and threatened at knifepoint. Donnarumma was beaten with hard knuckle gloves until he bled while the gang shouted “the money, the watches”. The gang escaped in minutes with cash, jewellery, watches and luxury bags worth just under one million euros.

This was not an isolated case. Prosecutors told the court the exclusive Avenue Montaigne area has been targeted by an increasingly young criminal network, with seven celebrities robbed between 2022 and 2025. Similar sentences were handed down earlier this year for burglaries at the Paris homes of former PSG stars Marquinhos and Angel Di Maria in 2021.

It is a pattern France knows too well. Highly lucrative, extremely violent and often targeting its own idols, as the prosecution put it.

Beyond football, this verdict highlights a human angle that often gets lost. Donnarumma and Elefante told the court through lawyers they remain profoundly shocked. For a young family, the loss went beyond valuables. For athletes and residents in central Paris, it raises fresh questions about security in supposedly secure luxury buildings.

French law allows for up to ten years for armed burglary of this nature. Prosecutors had sought ten years for Kherbouch. Two minors involved in the raid were already sentenced to three and four years by a children’s court in July. Some members of the seven man gang remain unidentified and are still wanted.

The conviction brings closure to a three year investigation, but police say the network behind celebrity burglaries in Paris is still active.

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