Tried on Wednesday for the serious road accident he caused under drugs last year in Seine-et-Marne, comedian Pierre Palmade said he “overwhelmed” by the serious injuries inflicted on the victims, to whom he asked « pardon ».
“The serious injuries of MY and the trauma of Mrs. C. (who lost her six-month-old fetus, editor’s note), it knocked me down. I am truly overwhelmed, tested to see them in real life”declared the 56-year-old artist at the Melun Criminal Court for his first public expression in this highly publicized affair.
Turning towards the benches of the civil parties, his hand on his stomach, little childish eyes in the middle of a livid face, Pierre Palmade addressed them directly for their “ask for forgiveness from the depths of your being”.
“I understand their anger. A crazy drug addict crashed into them, it’s almost inexcusable.”conceded the comedian, who became a showbiz pariah with this affair which revealed to the general public the dark side and decline of an artist stuck for years in his drug addiction, to the point of no longer being able to work.
This Friday, February 10, 2023, Pierre Palmade had been partying continuously without sleeping for three days between Paris and his country house in Cély-en-Bière, alternating injections of 3-MMC (a synthetic drug), taking cocaine and parties. of « chemsex » with « sex friends ».
“We are really like zombies, vegetables, naked, bloody”he describes to the judges. Dozed by 3-MMC, he “wake up again” with new cocaine rails to get behind the wheel.
At nightfall, the comedian gets in the car with two companions to go buy dinner at the local supermarket before the arrival of his dealer responsible for resupplying drugs.
“I see all three of us leaving the house euphoric and then it’s dark, I open my eyes and I’m (at the) Kremlin-Bicêtre hospital”says Pierre Palmade, who says he has no memory of the accident.
According to the investigating judge, in the straight line of a departmental road, the Peugeot 3008 driven by the comedian suddenly swerved off the road and collided with a family’s car on the opposite lane.
«In sick»
Pierre Palmade surrounded by his lawyers during his trial at the Melun court, in Seine-et-Marne, November 20, 2024 / ALAIN JOCARD / AFP
In addition to the actor, the accident left three people from the same family seriously injured: a 38-year-old man, his six-year-old son and his 27-year-old sister-in-law, who lost the baby she was expecting after the impact.
One road accident among the 52,000 recorded in mainland France that year. But due to the notoriety of the accused, this collision will trigger a media-judicial drama of rare intensity.
On his hospital bed, Pierre Palmade’s relatives explain to him that he hit a vehicle while driving in the wrong direction. There, “I understand that I am in hell”he testifies.
In the morning, the comedian was confronted in the courtroom with the story of the broken lives of the victims of the family of the car opposite.
Six months pregnant at the time of the accident, the woman sitting in the front passenger seat underwent an emergency cesarean section. Her unborn daughter, named Solin, was declared dead after 32 minutes of resuscitation, without giving any sign of extra-uterine life.
“It is very difficult for me to be present in this room today, there is a lot of work being done with my psychiatrist”declared the one who is now the mother of a two-month-old daughter, after a “very painful pregnancy”.
Pierre Palmade at the Melun court, in Seine-et-Marne, November 20, 2024 / Alain JOCARD / AFP
According to consistent case law from the Court of Cassation which has ruled on similar cases of road accidents, a child who is not born alive does not exist as a legal person.
Despite the prosecution’s requests to prosecute Pierre Palmade for involuntary manslaughter, the investigating judge sent him back to court on the sole charge of involuntary injuries, aggravated by taking drugs.
With his left arm in a sling, advancing towards the bar with infinite slowness while leaning on a crutch, driver Yuksel Y. aa describes his new life circumscribed by pain and injuries.
“I was a team leader, I had friends, during the weekend I tried to enjoy with my children, my family (…), today I can no longer do this kind of thing”he testified via a Turkish interpreter.
Pierre Palmade is a repeat offender due to a conviction in 2019 for drug use. He faces a sentence of fourteen years’ imprisonment and a fine of 200,000 euros.
