Six men aged 24 to 33 were on trial in Bordeaux for the assault in July 2022 of Pierre Le Camus, a former RN candidate in the legislative elections, on a café terrace. This Tuesday, June 6, the criminal court sentenced five of them to one year in prison and released the sixth defendant.
Unlike the public prosecutor who had asked for a heavier sentence for the main suspect, the criminal court did not make a distinction.
Four men are therefore sentenced to four years in prison, including three years suspended for 24 months. The penalty is adjustable. The defendants will be in house arrest under electronic surveillance. The sixth man was released, for lack of evidence proving his participation.
In this case, justice considered that there was indeed a collective and concerted action on previously identified people.
The videos shown to the audience show a scene of lightning violence. On the night of July 8 to 9, 2002, a wave of around thirty individuals swept over the terrace of a café in the Gambetta district of Bordeaux, and attacked Pierre Le Camus, RN manager of “Young people with Marine ” and RN candidate in the last legislative elections. His brother, Thomas and one of their friends are also targeted.
“Two people approached and started to have a threatening attitude towards us,” says the activist, who claims to have been recognized by these men who started hitting them. The situation would have quickly degenerated. After the first exchange of blows, around thirty individuals then joined the fight, throwing glasses and chairs into the establishment, before fleeing. Violent acts, punctuated by slogans, “the street is ours” et “Bordeaux Bordeaux Antifa”, confirmed by a video shown at the hearing. Pierre Le Camus then denounced an attack of a political nature.
Before the criminal court, the six defendants who are tried for violence in meetings and with weapons by destination, deny being part of this ultraleft. “ Me, politics, I have nothing to do with it” says one of them.
A version supported by their lawyer, Maître Hubert Hazera. “We absolutely want to make this trial a political trial, but it is not one. They are Ultramarines. We absolutely want to affiliate them with the Antifas, because it plays into the hands of the National Rally”.
The six defendants admit to being members of the Ultramarines, this association of supporters of the Girondins de Bordeaux, marked on the left. But at the helm, all explained that they were drunk that evening, and that they had followed a crowd movement that turned into a general fight, without knowing the reasons or the motivations. “I was drunk, I got into the fight, period! one of them will say.
According to the defense lawyer, the fight would have initially broken out between people who are not among the defendants and the group of Mr. Le Camus who made comments “ostentatiously racist and homophobic”.
Untangling the fake from the real. Is this a settling of accounts, in retaliation for violence committed two weeks earlier by members of the Bordeaux Nationalist small group, a targeted attack on a member of Marine Le Pen’s party, or a simple fight ?
Pierre Le Camus, who sticks to his guns, speaks of a punitive expedition. Monday June 5, on the first day of this trial, he was supported by the RN deputies of Gironde Edwige Diaz and Grégoire de Fournas, present at the hearing.
“It is not the first time that the Ultramarines have distinguished themselves by their activism, which is particularly violent and particularly radicalized. With Grégoire de Fournas, we challenged Mr. Darmanin, the Minister of the Interior to ask him for the dissolution of the Ultramarines ” announces the deputy of Gironde and vice-president of the National Rally.
“From the moment Gérald Darmanin dissolves ultra-right groups in Bordeaux, it seems logical that he should do the same for the ultra-left”, continues Grégoire de Fournas.
Witnesses reported hearing that night, “it’s for Saint-Michel”. Allusion to a fight that occurred a few days earlier, on June 25 in the district of the same name in Bordeaux. A case for which eight people close to the ultra-right were sentenced in May 2023 to prison terms for acts of aggravated racist violence and sexist outrage. Some were members of the Bordeaux Nationalist group, dissolved in February 2023. The six alleged attackers claim to have nothing to do with this other case. “I saw friends of mine fight, I naturally and stupidly went to defend them”.
In a pack, not all individuals are driven by the same intention!
Me Hubert Hazera, defense lawyer,
France3 Aquitaine
On the second and last day of the hearing, during his oral argument, Maitre Hazera asked the court not to attribute a political dimension to the actions of his clients. “Remember that there were 30 to 40 people, and you only have six. In a pack, not all the individuals are animated by the same intention”.
During his indictment, the public prosecutor expressed his conviction. According to him, it is indeed a punitive expedition in which the whole group has embarked “to avenge Saint Michael”. And to spin the metaphor with the world of football to which the defendants belong. “It was extreme right against extreme left. A classico, the Fas against the Antifas!”
A certainty that led him to request five years in prison, including four years suspended against the main suspect: David. M, 34 years old, “which knocked Thomas Camus to the ground, leaving him inert”. It is for this bus driver and father of a child a flexible sentence of one year at home, under electronic surveillance. To this must be added an obligation of care, of a course of citizenship at one’s expense, the prohibition to appear at the scene of the events, to come into contact with the co-defendants and the victims, to hold and carry a gun for five years
For the other five alleged assailants, the sentence requested is the same except for the length of detention. Three years’ imprisonment, including two years suspended. Always under electronic surveillance.
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