Two days were needed to dissect this dense and complex procedure in certain aspects.
Following an anonymous letter, the Ajaccio public prosecutor’s office opened an investigation in December 2014 to determine whether Vanina Pieriat that time president of theCorsica tourism agency (ATC), and Didier Leonetti, its general director, had committed reprehensible acts in the context of their mission. Four other people were prosecuted alongside them, they are suspected of having participated in or benefited from the actions denounced.
Ten years later, Valérie Marchand spoke for an hour and a half, the time necessary to unravel this procedure and personalize the offenses and therefore the sentences. “Intellectual honesty” of the representative of the public prosecutor was welcomed by all the defense lawyers, following several requests for acquittal. She nevertheless requested an 18-month suspended prison sentence and a fine of 60,000 euros against Paul Santoni, who regularly benefited from a subsidy from the ATC, but who is suspected of having produced forgeries for obtain the release of funds, i.e. 120,000 euros.
The prosecutor “expected” “more probity” from the ex-president of the ATC
Twelve months of suspended prison time and a fine of 20,000 euros were requested against Vanina Pieri who “got nothing” of the offenses charged and who had not “any interest” in the context of this affair, in the words of Valérie Marchand. But “we expected more integrity from her”believes the prosecutor.
The defense lawyers subsequently, and until the end of the day, delivered quality pleadings and firmly and unitedly clung to legal arguments. They thus ruled that a conviction “would be infamous” for their customers. The deliberations will be delivered on September 10 at 1:30 p.m.
