There was a pagnolesque atmosphere in the court of Rodez, this Wednesday, with in the role of the defendant, a loquacious retired Marseille with a singing accent. For 17 years, the latter has used to recharge in his second home in Aveyron, located in a peaceful subdivision of Verrières, far from the hustle and bustle of Provence.
In the neighborhood, the man says he has good relations with everyone and will have a short relationship with his neighbor … It will even end in the police court in 2019 for violence. Since this episode, the Marseillais says he has only had problems.
And in particular flat tires on his car, on three occasions. For him, there is no doubt: it is the work of the neighbor’s “new friend”. He knows him but they haven’t been talking to each other for a long time for some trivial matter.
Head trauma, multiple fractures …
One evening in August last, the Marseillais saw him in the street and decided to call him out for the story of the flat tires. “It is not me”, assures him his rival before being the victim of an outburst of violence. Headbuttings, on the ground… the victim, vulnerable following a motorcycle accident, loses consciousness and the doctors will note a head and facial trauma, a fracture of the nose, of the orbital floor… He also presents a deep wound of 10 cm on the scalp!
“He had a weapon, a baton”, he said in court, still marked physically and mentally by this assault. The defendant refutes this accusation. “It was ridiculous to have caught yourself like that”, he regrets, only half-heartedly, getting lost in various neighborhood stories!
“It’s not a simple neighborhood conflict, nor a fight: you smashed his head sir and it was free! Assize courts are full of badly placed blows you know”, recalls the prosecutor, requesting three years in prison, two of which were accompanied by a probationary period. The court reduced the sentence to two years in prison, including one year with a suspended sentence. Regarding the 12-month period, the retiree “hot blooded”, as his council said, will be able to arrange them before a judge of freedoms and detention. The victim, she will wait a little longer to know the damages …
A medical expertise having been requested because the latter indicated having lost the acuity of his left eye, a sign of the violence of the blows.
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