The first in a long series of upcoming indictments.
Friday, that of Agnès Buzyn, former Minister of Health, in the context of the Covid-19 file that the Court of Justice of the Republic has been investigating since June 2020, put the political world on hot coals.
After six hours of questioning by the three magistrates of the investigating committee of the jurisdiction and three hours of deliberation, Agnès Buzyn was accused of "endangering the lives of others".
A broad but serious criminal offense which supposes, according to article 223-1 of the penal code, to
"expose others directly to an immediate risk of death or of injuries likely to lead to mutilation or permanent disability by the manifestly deliberate violation a particular obligation of prudence or safety imposed by law or regulation ”
.
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An offense punishable by one year's imprisonment and a fine of 15,000 euros, which supposes an intention to harm and is linked to the violation of a specific legal text. To decide on this indictment, the three investigating judges relied on the decree appointing Agnès Buzyn specifying her duty to
"protect the health of the French".
In addition, the former minister is placed under the status of assisted witness for the count of
"voluntary abstention from fighting a disaster".
It is under this very broad qualification that the investigation was opened in June 2020. According to article 223-7, this offense, punishable by two years' imprisonment and a fine of 30,000 euros, s 'applies to
"anyone who voluntarily refrains from taking or initiating measures allowing, without risk for himself or for third parties, to fight a disaster likely to create a danger for the safety of persons".
Master the functioning of the administration
The Court of Justice of the Republic will have to rule on specific facts.
“So goes the criminal law. In any case, it will not be a question of judging the action of the government, ”
recalls the constitutionalist Jean-Philippe Derozier. At the heart of the file that started with the controversy aroused by the management of masks in winter 2019, intentionality, or if one prefers the will to harm, but also the necessary updating by the investigating magistrates of a link causality between the decisions taken and the deaths of Covid victims.
For now, judges seem to be primarily interested in the inability of government ministers to manage and energize their administrations to make them effective in the face of an unprecedented health crisis.
This will require the judges to have a good grasp of the functioning of the administration.
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For the time being, the investigating committee has chosen to summon for the purposes of indictment a minister who is no longer in business.
The next on the list would be the former Prime Minister, Édouard Philippe, a personality also pinned by the instruction and who nevertheless acquired, during this crisis, a strong popularity.
The Court of Justice of the Republic could go further, before the presidential election, by summoning the ministers currently in business and in particular Olivier Véran, the current Minister of Health.
Not to mention the Director General of Health, Jérôme Salomon, and the Director General of Public Health France, Geneviève Chêne.
Never has the pressure on political personnel been so strong.
A year ago, the gigantic simultaneous search of these ministers, members of the executive, whether or not in office, as well as senior officials, created a stir, in the midst of the still so complicated management of the health crisis.
"I should have formulated more caution or nuance": Édouard Philippe expresses his regrets about the management of the health crisis - Watch on Figaro Live
A justice submerged in complaints
Since the summer and the introduction of the health pass, the Court of Justice, like the Paris prosecutor's office, have also been inundated with complaints. 16,000 for the first this summer alone. 18,400 for the Paris prosecutor's office since March 2020, including 9,600 in the last few months for the side effects of the vaccine. These are typical or formatted complaints. A classic since the start of the Covid-19 crisis and containment, in March 2020.
Admittedly, the Paris prosecutor's office has classified, over the past six months, not only the latter, but also 6,600 complaints filed for violence against minors, linked to the wearing of masks by children.
But this surge revives the suspicion between the political world and justice.
Politicians denounce a
"growing judicialization of political life"
when judges fear
"a politicization of judicial life".
Among the magistrates, we walk on eggshells, uncomfortable with the procedure of the Court of Justice of the Republic, which does not provide for the constitution of civil party or the presence of victims.
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Within the executive, the question of removing it, as has been proposed by successive governments since 2013, is no longer on the agenda at the end of the five-year term. First, because a constitutional reform is totally unrealistic in terms of timing and politically dangerous.
"We would pass for those who want to silence justice,"
says one in the arcana of power. But the Covid affair also cools many politicians, reassured by a formation of judgment which counts, alongside the three professional magistrates, twelve senators and deputies controlling the political exercise.
"The day when this litigation will pass only by the common law courts, the judges will have the bridle completely on the neck",
fears this policy, now on the defensive.
Covid-19: indictment, Agnès Buzyn leaves the CJR - Watch on Figaro Live