The appeal trial of Mediator, this antidiabetic used as an appetite suppressant, which caused serious side effects in patients, is coming to an end. It’s time for arguments. The prosecution will present its requisitions on May 30 and 31.
“We decided to embroider [le] name [des victimes] inside our robes and wear them proudly on us”explains Wednesday, May 24 on France Bleu Gironde master Jean-Christophe Coubris, a Bordeaux lawyer who represents more than 3,600 civil parties in the Mediator appeal trial.
>> Mediator appeal trial: “The fine would have to be really huge to hurt” Servier laboratories, claims one of the victims
The Mediator’s appeal trial ends. It is time for the pleadings of the lawyers for the civil parties on Wednesday. Jean-Christophe Coubris, a Bordeaux lawyer, pleads at the bar with the names of the victims of the Servier laboratory embroidered on his black magistrate’s robe. “It is a decision that we have taken to allow our victims, very many, to be present at this hearing. These are unfortunately victims for some patients, for other elderly, who could not make the trip” , explains Me Jean-Christophe Coubris, on France Bleu Gironde.
“I couldn’t accept the idea that they weren’t present one way or another.”
Jean-Christophe Coubris, lawyerat franceinfo
“And so we decided to embroider their names inside our dresses and wear them proudly on us”, he continues. The Mediator is an antidiabetic used for a long time as an appetite suppressant, until its withdrawal from the market in 2009. It caused serious side effects in thousands of patients, including heart problems. “It’s a product that touched the heart, which killed a number of our victims, unfortunately we have more than 300 deaths recorded”deplores the lawyer.
“Since 2011, we have been fighting against the Servier laboratory”
Among these victims, Master Coubris recounts the ordeal of Francisca Guardiola, nicknamed “Paquita”, who like many patients had taken Mediator to lose weight. “She had heart valve disease.continues Jean-Christophe Coubris, he had to be operated on. The operation didn’t go very well. Then it took a heart transplant because otherwise she was going to die. And it turns out that the donor of his heart had also consumed Mediator. And today, years after his transplant, valvulopathy appears again. She keeps smiling, she will be present at the hearing, but she is really for me a victim who represents all the suffering that these thousands of people who consumed Mediator may have felt.
For the lawyer as for the civil parties, it is the end of a “a real obstacle course. Since 2011, we have been fighting against the Servier laboratory. It is also an expectation for all these victims that there is a final decision which will condemn, I hope, the Servier laboratory for all its misdeeds with the use of the Mediator”. The Servier laboratory had been sentenced at first instance to a fine of just under three million euros. “Above all, I am awaiting confirmation. The code was not intended for this type of behavior and the sums likely to be pronounced are almost all already at the maximum, except perhaps the scam. My expectation above all is to ‘to have confirmation as to the criminal convictions, penalties and civil compensation that were awarded by the court in March 2021’, [en première instance]. The trial is due to end on June 8. Then the civil parties will have to “Wait until December 20 to know the deliberation of the Court of Appeal which I hope will satisfy all the expectations of our victims”concludes the lawyer.