On April 18th 2021 five youths were found guilty on appeal of an attack in 2016 in which two police officers were set ablaze when their patrol car was pelted with petrol bombs in a Paris suburb. The five were given jail terms of between six and 18 years. Eight other youths were acquitted. The appeal verdicts, which were more lenient than the original trial in 2019, caused outrage among some politicians and led to a protest march by angry police officers. But Mediapart can reveal that the real scandal was the way in which police detectives ran the initial investigation into the brutal attack in Viry-Châtillon. Officers truncated or cut out entire sections of what suspects said in custody. They also put pressure on them to implicate other youths from the area. Lawyers for some of those involved have described it as a “legal scandal” and formal complaints have now been made to prosecutors about the conduct of the detectives. Pascale Pascariello reports.
A 66-year-old woman has lost all her appeals in France against a divorce case ruling that she was at fault in the collapse of her marriage after refusing to continue to have sexual relations with her husband. This month she submitted an ultimate appeal before the European Court of Human Rights in what may prove a watershed case on the notion of “conjugal duty”. Marine Turchi reports.
As new admissions of Covid-19 patients to hospitals and intensive care units continued on an upward trend in France over recent weeks, Prime Minister Jean Castex has appealed for 'a sense of responsibility' to encourage young aduts to observe social distancing and mask-wearing after widespread flouting of the measures during the summer holiday period.
The French head of state is commemorating the 80th anniversary of wartime leader Charles de Gaulle's BBC broadcast to occupied France after the 1940 Nazi invasion.
As the world of sport in France was engulfed in scandal over accusations of the covering up of widespread sexual abuse of young athletes, and notably the rape allegations by a former ice skating champion and three of her fellow skaters against their former coaches, French sports minister Roxana Maracineanu on Thursday appealed to 'to all victims, past and present, to speak up so that we can find the offenders and prosecute them'.
A conviction and six-month suspended jail sentence handed last year to Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, 69, archbishop of Lyon, for failing to inform the authorities about evidence of child sex abuse by a priest under his authority was overturned on appeal on Thursday, although an association of victims said they would in turn appeal the ruling.
An appeal by former French president Nicolas Sarkozy against a decision to prosecute him on charges of corrupting a senior magistrate to obtain information in a legal case concerning him has been rejected, and he is now expected to stand trial within months.
The first of two appeals lodged by Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy against a decision to send him for trial for influence peddling and corruption was thrown out by a Paris court on Monday.
Venezuelan-born Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, 68, nicknamed Carlos the Jackal, who became one of the most notorious far-left terrorists during the 1970s and 1980s and who was already serving two life sentennces for terrorism in France, on Thursday lost his appeal before a Paris court againt a previous conviction for leading a hand grenade attack which killed two people and wounded 34 others in a shopping mall in the French capital in 1974.
At the end of two weeks of hearings, a Paris court on Thursday deferred until May its verdict on the appeal by disgraced former French budget minister Jérôme Cahuzac against a three-year prison sentence handed to him in 2016 for tax fraud and money laundering. Cahuzac, 65, who Mediapart revealed in 2012 held a secret tax-haven bank account while leading a crackdown on tax fraud, did not contest his conviction, but sought a reduced sentence which would allow him to escape prison. While his lawyers argued that Cahuzac was a “broken” and “finished” man who risked taking his own life if sent behind bars, the prosecution has reiterated its demand for a three-year sentence. Mediapart legal affairs correspondent Michel Deléan was in court to follow the proceedings.
Following a legal appeal by marine parks in France, the country's highest administrative court, the Council of State, has overruled a decision taken last year by outgoing socialist govenment environment minister Ségolène Royal which banned the future breeding of dolphins and killer whales in captivity, after the court decided it had not been properly redacted, .
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