Tried in May before the Paris Criminal Court for illegal taking of interests, the former president of the Ile-de-France region (1998-2015), the socialist Jean-Paul Huchon, was sentenced, Wednesday June 26, to eight months suspended sentence. He was also sentenced to a fine of 10,000 euros and a one-year ineligibility sentence. A punishment “symbolic”according to the court, because the former president of the Ile-de-France council is no longer elected today.
Aged 77, he appeared in May in a case concerning a grant of 60,000 euros awarded by the region in 2014 to the Green Lotus association. This state aid was given in “conditions appearing irregular” and according to a process marred by anomalies, according to investigators. The case was taken to court after a complaint from the Union of Ile-de-France Taxpayers.
The Green Lotus association, which was to provide training to elected officials and representatives of Burmese civil society on subjects linked to sustainable development, was in fact led by Jean-Marc Brûlé (died in November 2023), then elected to Europe Ecologie-Les Verts (EELV) at the regional council. His name had been erased from the project sheet. The court recorded the extinction of the public action concerning him.
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Mr. Huchon, who assured that he had not taken part in the grant selection process, “knowingly performed the act characteristic of illegal taking of interests” which he had “necessarily knowledge”due to its “great political experience” and within the region, the court ruled.
