Condemned, yes.
Fired, no.
On Monday, the Canal + group's news channel said it was still counting on the star presenter of its mornings, despite his heavy conviction for aggravated minor corruption.
“Jean-Marc Morandini appealed, the presumption of innocence applies.
Jean-Marc Morandini continues to present his show on CNews, ”the management of the channel informed us in a terse press release.
It will therefore be on the air this Tuesday morning, as if nothing had happened, between 10:35 a.m. and noon.
The following days too.
A few hours earlier, the host was found "guilty of all the acts of which he was accused" by three young men, minors at the time of the events.
None of the arguments of his defense were accepted by the president of the Paris criminal court.
Jean-Marc Morandini was sentenced to one year in prison with a probationary reprieve of two years, as well as "an obligation of care" so that he understands his "transgressive acting out", without "real questioning question" of his behavior.
VIDEO.
Jean-Marc Morandini before the criminal court for "corruption of minors"
He is also registered in the automated judicial file of perpetrators of sexual and violent offenses (Fijais), even if the judge made it clear that he was "neither a rapist nor a pedophile".
At the end of the hearing, his lawyers let it be known that he was going to appeal the judgment.
Intimate photos claimed to joke 41 times.
At Canal +, we expected this sanction, without any sign of panic.
On a competing channel, Jean-Jacques Bourdin was dismissed as soon as a complaint for sexual assault was filed.
Morandini can always count on understanding bosses.
"We have supported him from the start, I don't see why that would change," one of his bosses told us on the eve of the trial.
Another figure of the antenna considers it reassuring to work in a company where an employee questioned by justice is not dismissed on the spot.
At the end of October, the host of CNews and NRJ 12 faced two of the three young complainants for more than seven hours.
One accuses him of having had conversations of a sexual nature, where the journalist, to "joke", asked him for intimate photos 41 times.
The other deplores having been invited to a nightmarish casting, where he was asked to get naked and masturbate in front of the star, in his offices located rue de la Pompe, in Paris (16th).
“No inappropriate gesture”, defends the person concerned
In a press release published on his blog, Morandini recalls
that he strongly disputes the facts of which he is accused and that he could “in no case” know the age of his interlocutors at the time of their exchanges.
“The sometimes distorting media coverage given to this affair forced him to recall that the complaints lodged against him did not concern any inappropriate gesture, but mainly exchanges of messages on Twitter,” he wrote.
In the meantime, Jean-Marc Morandini continues to use Elon Musk's social network.
Sunday evening, the day before the publication of the judgment, the host mistakenly commented on a pornographic video featuring two young children, posted by one of them.
"Ah yes, I didn't know them," he laughed, before deleting the message a little later in the evening.