2947 days.
The relatives of Jallal Hami, who drowned, have been awaiting this trial for eight years.
" It is unacceptable!
Is it to help us forget the faults of those responsible and dilute their sentences?
“Asks his brother Rachid.
After several years of investigation and a first trial sent back in September 2019, the case will finally be tried before the military chamber of the Rennes criminal court from this Monday.
Five cadets and two members of the Saint-Cyr Coëtquidan school hierarchy are being prosecuted for manslaughter.
The debates, which will last five days, should shed light on their responsibility in the death of young soldier Jallal Hami, one of the cadets of this elite school of the Army.
Cross a pond at 9 ° C in full gear
During the night of October 29 to 30, 2012, the gendarmerie of Guer (Morbihan) was called in the context of the worrying disappearance of this 24-year-old soldier.
Quickly, the lifeless body of the young man is spotted by firefighters near the bank of a pond.
The medical examiner concludes that he was drowning.
A dramatic end for this former Algerian refugee, who fled his country in 1992 with his family during the civil war.
Her mother had assumed sole responsibility for the education of her children who had grown up in Pierrefitte (Seine-Saint-Denis).
A great sportsman, of Muslim faith, "of exemplary righteousness", Jallal also shines at school.
He entered Sciences-po, obtained a master's degree in international security and studied Chinese.
“Saint-Cyr was a real vocation for him.
He wanted to defend the homeland that had welcomed him, ”says Rachid.
So what happened?
That night, Jallal was subjected with his classmates to swim across one of the ponds at the Coëtquidan military camp where swimming is normally prohibited.
A “bahutage” which was part of the integration period so that the new members could discover the culture of the prestigious military school.
A local way to strengthen cohesion, to introduce people to the size of the profession.
These somewhat specific sessions for the transmission of traditions are organized by the second-year cadets under the supervision of the hierarchy.
That night, the theme of the bahutage was the landing of Provence.
To the sound of Wagner's Valkyrie, several dozen young people had to swim across the pond, in full combat gear (rangers on their feet, helmets on their heads), for nearly fifty meters without having a foot, with the only help of a rope that sank into the water.
A commando-type exercise well beyond their skills.
The water in the pond was 9 ° C.
To refuse was to take the risk of being ostracized
Seized by the cold and the weight of the equipment, slowed down by the difficulties encountered by many of them, the young soldiers panicked and clung to each other so as not to sink.
Several had to be rescued.
“Personally, I thought I was going to go there.
Yet I am a good swimmer, ”one of the students explained to the investigators.
The security system was insufficient.
Organizers believed they had been cautious in excluding women and the injured.
Participation was optional but to refuse was to take the risk of being ostracized.
Rachid points to "the deception" of the organizers who knowingly hid what they had planned to do.
"There was something sadistic about seeing their comrades suffer."
Colonel Jacques Bessy, ex-Saint-Cyrien and president of the Association for the Defense of the Rights of the Military, which became a civil party, remembers that “already, in my time, one of my comrades had lost consciousness during a bahutage session ”.
According to Me Jean-Guillaume Le Mintier, lawyer for the Jallal family, “the seven defendants, through their actions or inactions, contributed to the drama.
They were all aware of the risks.
The activities of transmission of traditions gradually drifted into vulgar hazing ”.
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For Me William Pineau, the responsibility in this file of his client, Colonel Chanson, is “absolute nonsense because the control of the activity fell to the lower level.
He is prosecuted because he symbolizes the legal person that is the Army ”.
However, according to Me le Mintier, "this trial is not that of the uniform but that of men who no longer deserve to wear it".
Rather than abolish the bahutage, one has, according to Jacques Bessy, "preferred to institutionalize it by controlling its activities from afar and by giving in a way a delegation to young inexperienced cadets".
Rachid, he would only have wanted his brother to wear this uniform of which he had dreamed so much and which he unfortunately could only wear in his last home.