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Editorial Guérande
Published on
Dec 6 2024 at 6:44 a.m.
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The story is not simple. Having suffered abuse from his father during his childhood, the caregiver, now 47 years old, welcomed his ascendancy after his suicide attempt “to give him back a taste for life”. But, as the defense lawyer explained, Mr.e Pierre-Henri Marteret, during the trial on Tuesday December 3, 2024 at the Saint-Nazaire criminal court: “As soon as he got better, the father started insulting the son again”. The straw that broke the camel's back on July 10 at their home in Savenay? A remark about his son's motorcycle.
Who, on the stand, admitted having told him “Get out of the way”, having grabbed him, “put him on the ground”, explaining: “Cohabitation was no longer possible, my whole childhood came back, I had a faintness… “
He added:
“Despite my past, despite everything he could say about me, I did everything for him. »
His admitted violence was detailed by the prosecutor: “The defendant strangled his father twice… while the victim was suffocating, he held her to the ground with one foot.”
Following this unfortunate episode, when they no longer lived under the same roof for a month, the son sent numerous derogatory text messages for which he also had to report.
“I’m very hungry”
His psychiatric expertise highlighted “previous attacks of delusional bursts”.
The accused started to cry when his lawyer mentioned the insults and humiliations uttered by his father: “You're just an asshole, you're going to die…”.
Me Pierre-Henri Marteret stormed: “And today, it’s him we want to condemn! » , his client adding:
“I'm very upset, but yes, I used violence against my father, obviously I have to pay. »
He was sentenced to eight months in prison, suspended on probation, with an obligation to provide care and a ban on contact with his father for two years. Until then, the defendant had an entry in his criminal record for death threats in 2022.
The defendant was also prosecuted for a sexual assault on a minor, on July 25, 2024, in Trignac.
Touching?
That day, while he was testing his motorcycle leaving the garage, he ran out of fuel in Trignac. He stops two teenage girls on scooters and asks to take him to a bank ATM then to a gas station.
The passenger, who remained on site, advised the forty-year-old to hold on to the bar located at the rear of the vehicle and not to the driver's hips.
But, during the short trip, the teenager denounces that he touches her hips, goes down, hurts her shoulder.
At the ATM, a customer asks her if she is okay, because he feels she is panicking. She doesn't dare tell him that she's afraid.
So, instead of driving the passenger to the gas station, she decides to go find her friend and asks the forty-year-old to get off. He gets angry, removes his helmet and gloves, the passenger takes her place and the young girls leave.
Divergent versions
Identified during his bank withdrawal, when he was arrested, the forty-year-old recognized “security gestures, nothing sexual”.
The parents of the victim, who has just turned sixteen, are present, assisted by Me Astrid Bailleux who immediately argues:
“The teenager did not want to come, too terrified at the idea of meeting the man again who, during the journey, touched her hips and buttocks. »
For her, “there was an offense of opportunity, his actions degenerated into sexual assault”. She deplores the consequences: “The young girl is afraid to go out, she has nightmares, cries in her sleep.”
She does not fail to declare that, if this young girl is fragile and that she has previously suffered acts of harassment, she also criticizes, that according to her own sister, “the accused had been in crisis for several months at the time of the facts and did not want to seek treatment.
“He certainly scared the teenage girls”
Faced with the two opposing versions, the prosecutor gives credit to the sincerity of the victim: “There is no reason for her to lie”.
Recognizing “a moderation at the hearing, out of step with the aggressive attitude described in the file” of the defendant, she cites some harsh remarks made in police custody and declares: “He certainly scared the teenage girls”, before requesting six months in prison with suspended probation and several obligations and prohibitions.
Underlining “a fairly simple and radically different reading” of the file, Me Pierre-Henri Marteret pleads and obtains acquittal. He asks a question:
“If the teenager was so scared, why didn't she run away during the stop at the ATM? »
Having the last word, the defendant chants: “I have never, for my part, attacked this young girl”.
By pronouncing the acquittal, the president justifies: “With the elements in our possession, it is impossible for us to characterize the sexual offense, which does not call into question the victim's statements.”
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