He was on trial for insurrection. A 51-year-old man was sentenced this Monday by the criminal court of Pau (Pyrénées-Atlantiques) to ten months suspended prison sentence and a ban on possessing a weapon for five years for “provocation to arm oneself against authority of the State”, according to information from France Bleu Béarn and Sud Ouest.
In April 2020, in a context of the first confinement linked to the Covid-19 pandemic, this Béarnais had planned to go to Paris armed to remove the President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron by force.
Close to the Yellow Vests
At that time, according to the local press, this man isolated himself and registered on Facebook to keep himself busy. He then joined groups linked to the Yellow Vests. “I let myself be led,” he defended himself in court. The gendarmes were finally alerted by a member of the shooting club to which he himself was a member, while this aeronautics employee was trying to convince friends to follow him.
More than 5,000 rounds of ammunition and various weapons of several calibers were seized from the fifty-year-old’s home during a search. “At that moment I did not realize the extent that it had taken, I ignored all reasoning,” he declared in court, according to France Bleu Béarn. While the prosecution had requested an 18-month suspended prison sentence, the court ruled that the man had “taken a step back”. He deleted his Facebook account and is undergoing psychological monitoring.
