The princess and her bodyguard, the employee of the prefecture and the inspector.
These are some of the players in a driving license trafficking case that was tried this week in Pontoise.
"The princess", so called sometimes during the hearing, suspected of having paid 15,000 euros to obtain a permit by being replaced during the examination in Argenteuil in 2015, it is Jade, the wife of the businessman Arnaud Lagardère.
The international model explained himself during the three days of trial before the Pontoise Criminal Court, in the context of a case of corruption and fraudulent obtaining of a driving license.
A case which earned her to be placed in police custody, indicted, and her husband to be heard by the gendarmes.
On the day of the exam ... she's not the one who shows up
At his side, two other women are also prosecuted for having also bought their license, but also the whole chain of this traffic: the bodyguard of Jade Lagardère, who admitted to having paid the money by assuring to have acted on his own initiative. , driving school instructors, the inspector who knew, according to the investigation, to be conciliatory with his candidates, less with those who brought him nothing, the assistant to the delegate for traffic education of the prefecture of Val-d'Oise, since suspended and retired.
That is to say ten defendants, against whom the prosecutor was ultimately lenient, in view of the other cases already judged in particular in Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine), where the boss of a driving school had been sentenced to two years closed.
He requested a sentence of 300 day-fines at 20 euros for Jade Lagardère, who will have to relinquish 6,000 euros on pain of being placed in detention.
Sentences of equivalent day-fines were required against the other defendants, except for the two former police officers prosecuted in this case: the deputy to the prefecture delegate and the permit inspector, for whom the prosecutor requested eight months suspended sentence.
He added for the latter a definitive ban on exercising.
The court reserved its decision.
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It all started over five years ago.
On November 21, 2015 in Argenteuil, the gendarmes of the Versailles research section followed Jade Lagardère's examination.
They quickly notice that it is probably not the model who gets behind the wheel to get her license, but a person who replaces her, with her passport.
They have seen a previous questionable review before.
That day, the permit had been validated after just 22 minutes.
His bodyguard admits having paid 15,000 euros
In fact, the gendarmes have been investigating this case for several months already, since in July 2014, the Pontoise prosecutor was seized by the prefect of Val-d'Oise, recipient of anonymous letters denouncing the actions of several permit inspectors. to drive, including Jean-Michel M., at work in Argenteuil.
The prefecture's services had noted abnormally high success rates.
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Telephone tapping, surveillance ... The gendarmes deployed conventional means of investigation which led them to suspect the inspector.
An instructor from a driving school in Franconville is then in the sights.
The investigation leads the gendarmes to the deputy to the traffic education delegate of the prefecture, who gave additional examination places to his privileged relations.
A Chinese candidate is suspected of having paid 3,800 euros in cash to obtain her license.
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Another instructor is then suspected in Argenteuil, having also benefited from an exchange of examination places.
This will bring the gendarmes to the woman who obtained her license in 22 minutes and to Jade Lagardère.
The latter is suspected of having appealed to her bodyguard, a former GIGN, to obtain the permit.
He would have contacted a former gendarme and retired ex-policeman, now a driving school instructor, to finalize the case.
The file is completed and 15,000 euros are paid for this purpose.
During the investigation, the bodyguard assured to have acted on his own initiative, without the knowledge of his employers, the Lagardère family paying out of his pocket the 15,000 euros to the instructor so that he takes care of the permit. .
The latter did not hide anything from the hearing of his involvement: the 15,000 euros received, the 3,000 euros for him, the rest from the Argenteuil driving school instructor.
According to his lawyers, "no demonstration of any corruption pact"
"15,000 euros?
But it's huge, it's the price of a car ", exclaimed in substance at the helm Jade Lagardère, wondering what could have pushed her bodyguard to act thus, evoking the heroine of her own comic strip, Amber Blake, “who fights against corruption and pedophilia”.
She assured that she was never aware of these steps.
What the investigation of the gendarmes calls into question by eavesdropping, where she confides in particular: "What is this story?
You will end up putting me in trouble.
"
His lawyers, during the pleadings, considered that the famous defendant had been implicated "without the slightest demonstration of any pact of corruption". The lawyers, who requested the release of Jade Lagardère, noted the absence of any contact with the inspector and that there was "no request for a permit". One of the lawyers stressing that in this case, no permit had been received by the candidates, before adding: “Restoring someone's honor is also part of the work of justice. "
