Beaune shooting: relive the 2nd day of the trial at the Dijon assizes

Friday November 17, on the second day of the Beaune shooting trial, the hearing was devoted to hearing the civil parties (18 in total)

Here is the progress of the second day of hearing of the Beaune shooting trial

8:10 p.m.: The session is suspended. The debates will resume on Monday with medical assessments from the forensic doctor in the morning and ballistics experts in the afternoon.

8:00 p.m.: the President rereads the statements of those absent

7:55 p.m.: end of the physical hearing of the civil parties

7:15 p.m.: another victim testifies, corroborating before the Court the statements in his initial testimony.

6:45 p.m.: new testimony from a civil party. The President tries to re-confront the memories of this witness during her testimony, but the witness has difficulty confirming the statements made five years ago.

6:25 p.m.: During the testimony of a civil party, also affected by the shooting, the president notes the details provided during her testimony the day after the events, but also a profound inconsistency in certain details. The victim was unable to confirm certain details at the hearing.

6:00 p.m.: Another civil party testifies, and attests to having heard insults “Dirty buggers, we’re going to come back calibrated, everyone has heard them” during the first scene.

5:00 p.m.: Testimony from one of the civil parties, also seriously injured during the attack, who attests to having heard racist insults when the accused returned. His testimony covers the two sequences of the attack. The victim gives details of her medical history. President Marie-Sophie Martinet recalls that the medical expert will be heard on Monday. Victim of the first shooting, the victim describes the second sequence when the accused return: “I see the vehicle arriving as I get up, I see a silhouette, a shooter. The first detonation is for me […] They intended to fight, it’s gratuitous violence!”

4:00 p.m.: Testimony from one of the civil parties, who received pellets during the second shot (around a hundred). This seriously injured civil party describes a quality of life degraded by his injuries. This victim is currently incarcerated and when the defense lawyer asked him why he is currently in preventive detention, the latter refused to give details on the reasons for his current incarceration.

2:10 p.m.: Resumption of the hearing of the civil parties. New testimonies contradicted previously recorded statements, slowing down the debates and the hearing of the civil parties.

During the hearing of the civil parties, the President will attempt to clarify the exact circumstances of the events that took place on the evening of July 30, 2018. For the Court, it is a question of knowing what was done in terms of the shooting and what was said between the group of young people installed that evening in the square and the two accused.

The civil parties were heard in the morning and described the circumstances of the attack. Was the attack motivated by racist intent or was it intended to create fear? For the defense lawyers and the civil party, things are rather clear-cut.

For Maître Marine Berthelon, defense lawyer and advisor to Mr. Loïc Bongiolatti, “at no time did his client intend to commit homicide by going to the town of Beaune.”

And concerning the racist aspect that the attack could take on, the lawyer reports that her client “is clear, he never made the slightest racist statement.” This is also one of the issues at stake in the trial, namely the characterization as a racist attack, which makes Me Berthelon say: “A label must not be too quickly stuck on the backs of Mr. Bongiolatti and Mr. Kasala, we tend to stick a racist label on someone too quickly and we still need to be able to do so. prove on the side of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, this is far from being the case.”

Does the trial have an exemplary aspect? For Me Berthelon, his client Mr. Bongiolatti “has suffered acts since his incarceration and attacks linked to this label which has been stuck to him and he fears for his life and that of his family and I would not want this trial to make an example, when it is not characterized in the present case.”

There remains a question about the extent of the injuries of the victims, who received impacts from head to toe. The lawyer refers to the ballistics expertise (scheduled for Tuesday 11/21): “We have no information on the weapon which has not been found and the ballistics expert will be able to explain how we can end up with so many injured people without having a formal intention to kill.”

To conclude on the outcome of the trial, although her client risks life imprisonment, the lawyer declares: “We want a fair sentence and that there be a judicial truth that emerges from it, not a sentence as an example in relation to facts of a racist nature.”

“We have several associations on the bench of civil parties which have been formed, Licra and the Human Rights League have not renewed their request to constitute a civil party for this hearing. We have made a lot of noise about this affair, but it died down a bit like a breeze because we don’t have the elements in the file.”

“We will come back calibrated!”

For Maître Samuel Estève, in charge of the files of 8 civil parties, the challenge is to convince the Assize Court “that the facts are intentional and well qualified as an attempted assassination with a racist motive.”

Before the shooting, a first altercation had taken place: a punch given by one of the victims of the shooting to the driver. It is in this context that the two accused return by car. Even if the accused utter racist words, we can wonder about the nature of the shooting, at that moment, does it take on a racist character? For lawyer Me Estève, when you say: “Dirty buggers, we’re going to come back calibrated” and “a few hours later, they come back “calibrated”, the correlation is ready. The first racist remarks also color the second scene with a racist intention. And we come back calibrated and we shoot at eye level at a group of young people , things are extremely simple.”

This morning at the opening, the hearing began on the personality investigation of one of the two accused, Loïc Bongiolatti.

A suspension of the session took place, the defense lawyers having requested access to the criminal records of the civil parties, which was refused to them.