The Bobigny Criminal Court on Tuesday, December 1 released the coach and former member of the French judo team Alain Schmitt of domestic violence against Olympic champion Margaux Pinot.
“A court is never there to tell who is telling the truth and who is lying. In this case we do not have enough evidence of guilt. The court acquits you.“, declared the president of the court to the ex-judoka, at the end of his immediate appearance.
A case that shakes the world of judo
Margaux Pinot, European vice-champion, files a complaint for domestic violence. In the viewfinder of justice, his companion Alain Schmitt, who is also a coach and former member of the France team. pic.twitter.com/2LMz0ecVwq
– francetvsport (@francetvsport) November 30, 2021
During theaudience, these are two contradictory versions which were exposed by the two persons concerned. Alain Schmitt gave the story of a fight that looked like a “tornado” between two lovers with a stormy relationship.“I ain’t never hit a woman in my life, it’s rubbishi, “he repeated at the hearing, white T-shirt and bruised face.
Margaux Pinot, for her part, described her “fear“in the face of the punches that rained down on her during the night from Saturday to Sunday in her apartment in Blanc-Mesnil (Seine-Saint-Denis).”It wasn’t a judo fight, it was punches“blows the judokate, Olympic mixed team champion at the last Olympic Games in Tokyo, her face swollen by the bruises surrounding her eyes.supported by representatives of the French Judo Federation, it evokes a “psychological hold“from a trainer for whom she had”admiration“but which constantly belittled her, making her lose confidence in her.
The court has passed “next to a number of dependent items“Like those neighbors who heard her calls for help, and where she took refuge, regretted Stéphane Maugendre, the lawyer for judokate. “With the strength that this man has, he has the ability to do much more than that“, pleaded for his part Malik Behloul, counsel to Alain Schmitt, affirming that the sportswoman had lied on all the line.
The court’s decision sparked a strong reaction from Olympic champion Clarisse Agbégnénou, teammate of Margaux Pinot, who reacted to her friend’s interview in Le Parisien. [article payant] of Wednesday December 1 which declared: “I came close to death“.
I do not have the words to express everything that is going on in my head and my body as a woman in the face of what my teammate Margaux Pinot has gone through.
All the more shocked by the court’s decision. What does it take for the sanctions to fall, death? https://t.co/gITdlNxmLs– AGBÉGNÉNOU Clarisse (@ Gnougnou25) December 1, 2021
The coach of the French judo team was to leave France five hours after the fact, towards Israel where he is expected to take the reins of the national women’s team.