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"Why the hell did Adel B. set the bakery on fire?"
The opening of the pleadings of the Advocate General of the Assize Court of Lyon translated the meaning of five days of debate, this Thursday.
A plea which sought to demonstrate the inconsistency of the four versions of the facts delivered by the arsonist, requesting 30 years in prison against the man who has already been sentenced at first instance to 15 years in prison for these facts in Tunisia, where he fled and appealed.
Then, like the civil parties, to qualify the motive of the two defendants present, the managers of the ZZ bakery at 125, route de Vienne, suspected of having ordered the fatal fire as part of a fraud at the insurance, insisting on the financial difficulties of the business, the enhancement of the insurance policy and the inflated invoices.
“the absence of a formal element”
.
And Me François Saint-Pierre to reprimand
"inhuman requisitions"
in front of the 28 years and 25 years requested by the public prosecutor against the two partners.
The scam as a motive
The version of the police investigation, which led the two defendants to pre-trial detention, tends to illustrate the interest of a possible scam fomented by Zouhaier B. and Zouhir H., with this enhanced insurance contract at the end of December, as the prosecution again pointed this out.
A response to the attack on their window by a ram truck, then set on fire, after a few days of opening, according to the defendants who therefore see it as a competitor's revenge.
The track was evacuated by the Advocate General, recalling that the four defendants tried in correctional in a few months for these facts are not from the middle of the bakery, while the traders were regularly threatened and extorted in this neighborhood plagued by the drug trafficking.
"What competition could the ZZ Bakery have?"
, he sweeps, underlining the calamitous management of the trade of which the saleswoman falls asleep while waiting for the customers and the baker is bored.
In defence, Me Katia Garbiel recalled the pressure from the family of the manager of the neighboring bakery on a flour supplier not to supply ZZ, whose installation he viewed with a dim view, to the point of mentioning it at a meeting of traders. neighborhood.
Inflated numbers
The poor financial health of the business opened two months before the dramatic fire of February 9 confirmed the motive for the insurance scam during the investigation.
And the Advocate General to insist on the unpaid bakery and the swelling of the turnover.
Zouhaier B. admitted having tried to profit
a posteriori
of the fire, by presenting false invoices to obtain insurance reimbursements, which were in progress at the time of the arrest of the accused.
But he disputes being at the origin of the disaster, specifies his counsel, stressing that the motive cannot replace the proof.
The interest in acting of the accused also lacking in seriousness, according to him, while the son of Zouhaier B., who like his father runs several bakeries in Lyon, assured the bar of the impossibility of drawing up the balance sheet of a trade after two months of operation.
And the father to assure that he had nothing to gain from the fire of the shop, where he had invested 5000 personal euros without counting the loans.
"Perhaps, but you had a lot to lose
," he was told.
"No proof"
"Obviously these people did not want to kill our children but they killed them anyway"
, summarizes the public prosecutor, quoting the words of Clara's mother during the investigation.
“A diabolical plan”
, says this mother and grandmother against the
“collateral and indirect victims of the madness of men”
, for Me Guillaume Beaulieu who defends the family of the surviving father, pointing out the denials of the accused.
“It was this indifference that left Clara, Anna and unborn baby George to their fate
,” he said.
Enough to make Me Julien Charle jump in defense of Zouhir H., a few hours later, pointing to
"hypotheses"
.
“Evidence, I consider that we have none”
.
The overwhelmed arsonist
The civil parties recalled the meeting with the arsonist and the calls made to him.
They recall the hasty departure of the saleswoman on the day of the fire and the ease with which the arsonist slipped into the bakery from the back, via the heavy carriage door and an unlocked second one.
The Advocate General stressed the arsonist's need for money, while the defense hammered home the lack of evidence that money was handed over.
The arsonist whose burn injuries and presence at the scene were reported, by his DNA and his telephone.
The Advocate General showed the inconsistencies of the explanations of the one whose video surveillance reveals the whereabouts with a trash can which will be found melted in the bakery where two fires were noted, confirming the criminal trail.
An extremely violent fire whose soot flooded the lungs of Clara and Anna, who died in the apartment, and those of Julien in the front row of the yard, still haggard with pain.
"He did not move from his sidewalk
," says Clara's family lawyer.
Death has passed and death has taken everything
.
Even Clara's notebooks were burned, the photos, the memories.
“Today Julien only keeps a comforter from his daughter that he picked up at school
, continues the lawyer.
If he doesn't have it, he can't fall asleep.
»
"Risk of miscarriage of justice"
“We were all flabbergasted and upset by the speeches
, declared Me Katia Gabriel, underlining the pain of the family.
These facts are so serious that there has been social indignation.
She has no place in this forum.
By demanding socially from the culprits, we judicially manufacture culprits.
Me Saint-Pierre pointed to a
"situation of major risk of miscarriage of justice"
, while the three defense lawyers finally asked for the acquittal of the defendants in the absence, according to them, of certain evidence, despite the motive.
And Katia Gabriel to strike at the address of the public prosecutor: “
The why cannot replace the how
”.