30,000 euros fine including 20,000 euros suspended were requested this Thursday, November 14 against Bernard Casoni. The former US Orléans coach appeared before the Orléans judicial court for public racist insult. Comments revealed last year by France Blue Orléans. During a press conference, the coach of the Orléans football club said of his players, “they are no more stupid than North Africans“.
The question before the Orléans judicial court was not whether Bernard Casoni is racist but whether the former US Orléans coach made racist comments. Nuance matters, only the expression public insult or public provocation of a racist nature is criminally punishable under French law. And it is for this sentence spoken in public, only this sentencethat Bernard Casoni was the subject of prosecution.
“Everyday racism”
For all the civil parties, it does not no doubt of the racist character of these remarks. “It’s a hierarchy, a stigmatization of an ethnic group“, indicates Me Bernard Schmid, the lawyer for MRAP, the Movement against racism and for friendship between peoples. “A racist cliché“, adds Me Guillaume Traynard, the defender of SOS Racisme, “an everyday racism which between humor and buffoonery no longer has its place”. “Bernard Casoni is looked at, listened to, with his track record, his authority”, underlines Me Damien Gevaudan, lawyer for Licra. Another lawyer adds: “We expect something else from him.“
“We’re going too far”
Deputy prosecutor, Eléna Chevallier, goes further. Words “intolerable” according to the magistrate, who continues: “How can we not say that it is hurtful when we treat North Africans as subhuman, as a subrace?“. “You go too far, way too far“, protests the lawyer of the former OM player, who denounces “a trial for example“. For Me Emmanuel Daoud, “Bernard Casoni did not inferiorize the Maghreb, he only referred to his previous experience and the last five seasons spent in the Maghreb before arriving in Orléans.“
The public prosecutor requested 30,000 euros fine including 20,000 euros suspended against Bernard Casoni. He also called for the judgment to be displayed within the USO club for two months and publicized in the press. The judgment was reserved and will be rendered on January 9, 2025. The former USO coach, who is now a coach on the sidelines of a club in Ivory Coast, was absent for his trial before the judicial court.
