The Belfort court on Wednesday sentenced Mathieu Perez, 26, to 4 months in prison with probationary suspension one year and to pay € 1,700 to the Departmental Federation for Fishing and the Protection of the Aquatic Environment of the Territoire de Belfort. The young man was elected president of the federation on May 2, 2019, then dismissed on July 18, in particular for having paid for goods and services with the blue card of the structure, without proof.
“It’s a real putsch”
To estimate the damage suffered by the federation, it was necessary add up all expenses by Mathieu Perez with the credit card in question: an iPhone, a Longchamp bag at 450 €, a hotel night at 178 €, a meal in a restaurant at 173 €, a laptop, a drill at 384 €, boots of fishing at 380 €, as well as a series of parking tickets. All that was to reimburse the money owed to him by the federation, defended the former president. € 1,350 worth of clothing that the board refused to pay him. “You can’t do justice on your own”, reminded him the president of the tribunal.
Everything could have been settled amicably, but the defendant refused to return the goods in question, because he did not recognize his dismissal and felt he was still president. “It is a real putsch and I would be criminal to leave the federation to people who do not have the mandate to lead it”, he said at the bar. He even kept the keys to the local federation. It is his lawyer who has them returned during his plea, hoping to obtain an exemption from sentence for his client. “We had already changed the locks”, comments the current president of the federation, Serge Philémon, who hopes to turn this page which has endangered the whole structure.