One of the protagonists in the Benalla affair, the soldier Chokri Wakrim, implicated members of the Élysée in the disappearance of two safes of the former Elysée project manager, according to information from Mediapart.
Heard on Tuesday by the Criminal Brigade, Chokri Wakrim said he saw two members of the presidency in the presence of the first safe in the Parisian apartment of Pascale Perez, a businesswoman who helped Alexandre Benalla, said one of the sources close to the case.
According to the witness, it was Christian Guédon, member of the Presidency of the Republic Security Group (GSPR), and an advisor to the Chief of the General Staff of Emmanuel Macron, Ludovic Chaker, also former secretary general of En Marche.
Unable to find safes
This chest, which Alexandre Benalla used to store his weapons, was no longer at home during the July 2018 search when the business started. Unidentified, he is at the heart of one aspect of the sprawling affair that bears his name.
Since February 2019, investigators have been seeking to determine whether there has been concealment of evidence from the former project manager. This strongbox “must have been taken to a safe place by a person but it was not I who took care of this,” replied Alexandre Benalla in the summer of 2018.
On Twitter Wednesday, he denounced the article by Mediapart, described as “copy and paste of a report by Chokri Wakrim, without checking even a word of what this gentleman invents …” “The truth, c ‘is that there are 4 chests’, he quipped.
So for MERDIAPART, the fact of making a statement on a Minutes, it is a TRUTH, impatient that they give as much credit to my statements!
– Alexandre Benalla (@benallaoff) January 22, 2020
A nine-hour hearing
Auditioned in July, Ludovic Chaker admitted having participated in the exfiltration of the Benalla family, whose home was surrounded by the media. But it “cfirmly have from the start moved this chest “, according to those around him. During his hearing, which lasted more than nine hours, Chokri Wakrim also said that he had witnessed a conversation during which Alexandre Benalla asked Christian Guédon to empty a second safe in his office at the Élysée Palace.
According to Chokri Wakrim, the contents of this chest, emptied just before the search of July 25, 2018, had been carried in a sports bag, which he said he saw at the home of Pascale Perez. In mid-November, this non-commissioned officer of the air force had written to the Paris prosecutor to request his hearing, already mentioning “the existence of a second chest (…) at the Élysée Palace”.
The investigation had just been handed over to an investigating judge. Accused in early 2019 of a Liberation article of having moved the first safe, Chokri Wakrim has always denied any role in this disappearance.
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