“Le Canard enchaîné” suspected of fictitious employment, an investigation opened for “abuse of corporate assets” and “receiving”

The newspaper The chained Duck is targeted by a preliminary investigation opened by the Paris prosecutor’s office for “abuse of social property” and “receiving”, according to information from France Inter. The newspaper is suspected of fictitious employment, after a complaint from one of its journalists.

The editorial journalist who filed a complaint against X on May 10 is none other than Christophe Nobili, the one who had released the case of the Fillon couple’s fictitious jobs, in 2017, within the chained duck. The journalist discovered within the staff of the newspaper, composed of about twenty people, an employee whom he did not know, whose press card is affiliated with the satirical newspaper.

This employee turns out to be the companion of the cartoonist André Escaro, 94 years old today, a historical signature of the newspaper since 1959 and member of the board of directors of the newspaper until last summer until June 22.

Christophe Nobili hesitated to denounce these facts, for the reputation of his newspaper, but the silence would have been unbearable to him. A “terrible dilemma”, according to his lawyer Pierre-Olivier Lambert. According to him, the incriminated salary payments run over a period of about twenty years and reach an estimated loss of three million euros.

After his complaint filed on May 10 with the status of whistleblower, the police officers of the Paris financial brigade began their investigation. From the beginning of the summer, a first series of hearings of the employees of the weekly took place. These hearings have accelerated this past week.