Under a complaint in Geneva for sexual coercion and rape in particular, Tariq Ramadan wants to impose silence since 2018 on the lawyers of Brigitte *, the Swiss complainant, in the name of the presumption of innocence. In October, the Islamologist appealed to the Federal Court (TF) for this purpose. According to our information, the TF has just dismissed it.
Counsel for the complainant, Mes Robert Assaël and Alec Reymond welcome the decision: “Our client is satisfied that the accused’s attempt to muzzle her and force her to silence, from which she had the courage to leave, failed, the Federal Court sweeping the appeal. This judgment is important because it recalls that the principle, enshrined in the Code of Criminal Procedure, is freedom of expression. So one party can speak on a procedure, without denigrating the other party of course. ”
Relying in particular on the reasoning of the cantonal judges, the TF notes that the cantonal court held that there was nothing to confirm that Brigitte or her lawyers “were the source of the leaks and information published in the press and did not resort to it.” brings no argument to contradict this assertion. In addition, the federal judges continue, “the Appellant and his lawyers also do not fail to express themselves in the press. ”
In June 2018, the accused complained to the Public Prosecutor’s Office about the media interventions by the complainant’s counsel, which, according to him, violates the presumption of innocence. He asked that he be ordered to remain silent. The prosecutor asked the complainant to decide on this request. What she did. In September 2018, the Public Prosecutor, then in October the Criminal Appeal Chamber (CPR) rejected the request of Tariq Ramadan, who first seized the TF.
In April 2019, the TF noted that the Islamologist’s right to be heard had not been respected. For the judges, the Public Prosecutor should have forwarded Brigitte’s arguments to him. What was done. But Tariq Ramadan persisted in asking the courts to silence the complainant Brigitte. In its latest decision, dated January 16, the TF once again disavows the Muslim intellectual.
The judges of Mon-Repos confirm the previous decision of the CPR for which Tariq Ramadan cannot demand “that his notoriety protect him, more than another justiciable similarly accused, from a disclosure of his identity, even if the complainant did not allow hers to pierce. The relative frequency of media coverage regarding the resort in the spring-summer of 2018 cannot be equated with a smear campaign conducted through the press. “In addition,” the media gave the floor to the defense. ”
In France, Tariq Ramadan was indicted in February 2018 for two rapes. He was released on bail in November 2018, after nine months in pre-trial detention. The procedure heard in Geneva following the complaint filed in April 2018 will continue with hearings scheduled in principle in France.
The TF underlines in its recent decision that the defense of Tariq Ramadan in France is expressed “widely in the media and the appellant assisted by two lawyers in Geneva, is not without the means to do the same in Switzerland. These previous lawyers have also expressed themselves in the media and, in response to the announcement of a preventive measure, these current lawyers have published a denial by press release. In these circumstances, there is no need to fear unilateral information by the media, prejudicial to the presumption of innocence or to the course of the proceedings. ”
In this case, indicate Mes Assaël and Reymond, the victim never expressed himself in the media: “She prefers to reserve her statements to justice, despairing of not yet being summoned. His lawyers have made statements to the press, but with a measure that contrasts drastically with the repeated interventions of previous Geneva lawyers and French lawyers of the defendant, who has himself written a book on the case! He was certainly in a bad position to ask that the victim and his lawyers be held to silence! “
Development follows
* Fictitious first name
Created: 05.02.2020, 10h48
–
