one year suspended prison sentence required against the Minister of Justice, tried for “illegal taking of interests”

The public prosecutor requested, Wednesday November 15, a one-year suspended prison sentence against the Minister of Justice, Eric Dupond-Moretti, tried for illegal taking of interests by the Court of Justice of the Republic (CJR). “At the end of these 10 days of hearing, I for my part became convinced that the offense of illegal taking of interests was constituted”declared Attorney General Rémy Heitz during the indictment.

The Minister of Justice, the first Minister of Justice to be tried in the exercise of his functions, is accused of having ordered administrative investigations against four magistrates with whom he had had disagreements when he was lawyer. “The minister did not want to hear the warnings” on the situation of conflict of interest in which he found himself, estimated Rémy Heitz, who petitioned against his supervisory minister. “By opening these investigations, he took a step that he should never have taken”he insisted, recalling that “the guilty intention, in matters of illegal taking of interests, is constituted by the sole fact that the author knowingly performed the act constituting the material element of the offense.”

Eric Dupond-Moretti faces five years in prison and a fine of 500,000 euros. An additional penalty of disqualification from holding public office may be imposed. The decision of the Court, composed of three magistrates and twelve parliamentarians, will be deliberated, after the pleadings of the minister’s lawyers on Thursday.