France 3 broadcasts a three -part documentary on Wednesday on the trial of the senior French official, responsible for the deportation of more than a thousand people of Jewish confession between 1942 and 1944.
The trial for complicity of crime against humanity which took place at the Gironde Assize Court between October 1997 and April 1998 proved to be very complex. After more than sixteen years of investigation and six months of hearing, the accusation tried to Starting light on the involvement of the French State in the deportation of the Jews, through the role that played Maurice Paponat the head of the Jewish Questions Service of the Gironde between 1942 and 1944. The former secretary general of the prefecture of Bordeaux under The Vichy regime was accused of facilitating the deportation of 1,690 Jews, including more than 200 children, in Drancy and then in Auschwitz.
“What is accused of Maurice Papon is an office crime. He is a man who, in his office at the prefecture, puts stamps on decisions that will have dramatic consequences”, explains the legal journalist Dominique Verdeilhan in the three -part documentary, entitled The trial of Maurice Papon, Directed by Gabriel Le Bomin and broadcast Wednesday April 16 at 9:05 p.m. on France 3.
This series returns through numerous testimonies on the trial during which the former senior official, who served all the powers, from Marshal Pétain to Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, fought his role in the roundup of Jews.
It reveals the various twists and turns that have enamelled the six months of audience and demonstrates the determination of the judges and the many lawyers of the civil party to undermine the defense of Maurice Papon, who does not hesitate to arrange with the reality of the facts. At the heart of his denials: the fate of more than 200 deported Jewish children.
At the beginning of his trial, Maurice Papon, 87 years old, is authorized to appear free for health reasons, to everyone’s surprise. Lawyers of the civil party, angry, see it as a way of victimize this man who, before his incarceration, claims his innocence all the length of interviews, and claimed to be “the most persecuted man after [Alfred] Dreyfus.”
A posture that he will keep throughout his trial. The old senior official denies his active participation having allowed the roundup of Jewish families and discusses himself on the Germans, its superiors or its subordinates. His signature, however, is at the bottom of each act authorizing the arrest and the deportation of these men and women.
“[Maurice Papon] Has occupied important positions in his political career (…), but with a behavior as a small thug. [Il était] Capable of denying the most obvious things until he could not do otherwise and at that time, he adapted a little. “
Pierre Mairat, lawyer for the civil partyIn the documentary “The Maurice Papon trial”
On July 16, 1942, arrests of Jews took place throughout France, including the terrible HIV bike round. called “oSpring -winds “, this shot of magnitude does not spare Bordeaux and its surroundings, located in the occupied zone. On July 18, 172 Jews living in the region were deported. Initially, children under the age of 15 whose parents were arrested are entrusted to host families.
But on August 25, the prefecture chartered taxis responsible for recovering all these children scattered in Gironde and bringing them back to an internment camp before their departure for the camps. The payment of invoices of journeys by the Jewish Questions Service proves the responsibility of the prefecture of Bordeaux – and therefore of Maurice Papon.
Asked during his trial on the reasons why he authorized the sending to the death of all these children placed, the accused’s response causes indignation. “”ILya of the parents who had entrusted their children and then claimed them. They wanted the children to join them “he assures the bar. “It’s cynicism ! It’s absolutely terrifying “, indignant In the documentary, me Alain Jakubowicz, who represented the Israelite consistory during the trial and the B’rith of France. To hear it, “cis by humanity that he sent children to death, so as not to Separate families! C‘is the whole theory of Vichy to give oneself good consciousness “, continues the lawyer for civil parties.
Judge Jean-Louis Castagnède, president of the court, considers the justifications for Maurice Papon and gives him a scathing answer: “These parents, they claim nothing, because in August they died. “. The accused remains silent. “”It was enough not to send the taxis to get these children, Resumes Alain Jakubowicz in the documentary. Children did not leave and the children would be alive! It is really a kind of obsession, in a way, of the task well done, [d’être un] Good civil servant. This is what we called paper crime: unlike Klaus Barbie, he has no blood on his hands. But he has a lot about consciousness. ”
The testimony at the helm of Thérèse Stopnicki, whose two little sisters, Rachel (2 years old) and Nelly (5 years old), were deported in August 1942, also destroyed the arguments of Maurice Papon, caught in the act of lies during her trial, as during a television program nine months before the start of the hearing.
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While journalist Paul Amar presented him with the photos of the two little girls who died in Auschwitz, the senior official was cleared of any responsibility. “A lady (…), who had the little girls in custody, testifies that the children stopnicki were claimed by the parents (…) Why stick to my back this infamy?”, Indigated to the Maurice Papon screen. However, Thérèse Stopnicki relates during the trial that he met in 1988 the woman who had welcomed her sisters. She never told him that her parents, sent in deportation, wanted to recover the children.
“She tried to be a second mom for them (…). She was very, very unhappy. She told me that she would have liked to keep them, and that it was at the request of the country guard and on the order of the prefecture that she was forced to bring them back to Bordeaux.”
Thérèse Stopnicki, whose two little sisters were deportedIn the documentary “The Maurice Papon trial”
At the end of this trial, the nine jurors will take nineteen hours to answer the 764 questions of the indictment. Maurice Papon will be sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment for the complicity of crime against humanity. He made three years in prison before being under house arrest until his death in February 2007, at the age of 96. Judge Jean-Louis Castagnède will disappear on the same day as the senior official of a rupture of aneurysm.
The documentary, The trial of Maurice Papon, Directed by Gabriel Le Bomin, was broadcast on Wednesday April 16 at 9:05 p.m. on France 3 and is visible on the France.TV platform.
