“A system organized by the party leadership and to serve the interests of the party.” Beginning their indictment at the RN trial, the prosecutors detailed on Wednesday morning how Marine Le Pen had, according to them, been involved in the embezzlement of European funds.
After a month and a half of hearing, the three-time presidential candidate will be determined at the end of the day on the penalties requested by the prosecution against her, her party and 24 other defendants – party executives, ex-MEPs and former parliamentary assistants.
“We are not here today because of relentlessness”, nor because of a denunciation “from the European Parliament”, but at the end of “a long judicial investigation”, immediately declares one of the two representatives of the prosecution, Louise Neyton.
“You will make your decision in view of the documents in the file”, and after “six weeks of hearing” and “particularly extensive debates”, continues the magistrate in a full courtroom where Marine Le Pen sat in the first rank alongside Louis Aliot, current number 2 of the RN.
“I am in the same state of mind as last week, as the week before. It is the normal course of a trial, with today an accusation which accuses, it is not very original”, declared the leader of the far right upon arriving at court.
By beginning their requisitions which must last all day, the two magistrates detail the architecture of a “system” which according to them was put in place at the National Front (now RN) between 2004 and 2016, consisting of hiring parliamentary assistants “fictitious” Europeans who actually worked for the party.
At the time, “the party was in a particularly tense financial situation. Anything that could contribute to reducing costs would be used systematically”, whether “legal or not”, affirmed Louise Neyton, while Marine Le Pen shakes her head vigorously.
The European Parliament only carries out “accounting checks”, for the rest it “trusts” MEPs in the use of their monthly allocation of 21,000 euros: “So, it's too tempting, these envelopes will appear as a windfall and be used as such,” insists the magistrate.
– “Fiction alternative” –
For the prosecution, this “system will further strengthen and take on a new dimension” with the arrival, in 2011, of Marine Le Pen at the head of the party, with an employee responsible for managing European contracts, who reports “only” to the president, the “order giver”.
In 2014, after the election of around twenty FN MEPs, the treasurer of the Wallerand de Saint-Just party wrote: “We will only get out of this if we make significant savings thanks to the European Parliament”, recalls the prosecutor.
And to mention the emails – “not all, there are too many” – talking about “financial arrangements”, “transfers” from a particular assistant “to” a particular MP depending on the availability of envelopes. One or the other, “you can choose”, it is written in a message.
She also addresses this famous meeting to welcome new deputies, in the summer of 2014, where Ms. Le Pen allegedly warned those newly elected that they should only take one assistant, the rest of the envelope having to return to the party. So faced with all this, “the alternative fiction presented to you in defense” is not “corroborated by any element”, believes the prosecutor.
The rest of the indictment, which will resume at 2:00 p.m., must focus on each of the defendants: the nine former Frontist MEPs, their 12 former parliamentary assistants, the accountants and the treasurer, and finally the party itself. They face sentences of up to 10 years' imprisonment, a fine of one million euros and a penalty of ineligibility, which could seriously hamper Ms. Le Pen's ambitions for the 2027 presidential election.
In this case, it comes down to a “simple question”: “did the parliamentary assistant work for his deputy or for a third party?”, estimated the second prosecutor, Nicolas Barret. Concerning the “proof” of their activity for their elected officials, “we have nothing!”. “We do have the capacity to preserve documents, so if the proof is not found, it is because it does not exist,” he added.
The European Parliament estimated its financial damage at 4.5 million euros, but only claimed 3.4 million (a part having been reimbursed).
