Officially, she resigned for
“health reasons”
.
Mélanie Boulanger, socialist mayor of Canteleu in Seine-Maritime, announced this Wednesday, February 21 that she was leaving her position at the head of the Normandy municipality.
At the same time, she
“sent her resignation from the mandate of regional advisor to the president of the Normandy region,”
the town hall said in a press release.
However, she will remain a member of the Canteleu municipal council.
This decision was
“difficult to make”,
according to his lawyer, Arnaud de Saint Remy, interviewed by France Bleu Normandie
.
His resignation is
“neither a failure, nor an admission of anything, but a withdrawal for health reasons which are totally legitimate and respectable”
, he continues, affirming that he would accompany him
“until 'at the end"
.
Suspected of “providing information to traffickers”
The PS mayor is being prosecuted, alongside one of her deputies, Hasbi Colak, for
"complicity in drug trafficking"
, according to the Bobigny prosecutor's office.
As revealed by our colleagues from Le
Monde
, the mayor of Canteleu, a figure of the Rouen PS and head of the PS-EELV list in the 2021 regional elections, is accused of having made herself
“complicit by aid or assistance in transport offenses , unauthorized acquisition, possession and offer or transfer of narcotics”
, according to the prosecution’s requisitions.
The origins of the case begin in 2019. That year, a cocaine trafficker, linked to the
“Meziani” family, an
“important”
family
from Canteleu, was arrested in Seine-Saint-Denis.
This family,
“in the sights of the authorities for several years (...) very strongly influenced the local political world”
of the commune with 14,000 inhabitants,
a source close to the matter told Le
Monde .
According to our colleagues, the car used by this cocaine trafficker belonged to a company of which Hasbi Colak is the manager.
A judicial investigation is then opened for drug trafficking and criminal conspiracy and led by a judge from Bobigny.
Two years later, in October 2021, Mélanie Boulanger and her deputy were taken into police custody during an anti-narcotics raid, then released the next day.
She would have helped this trafficking
“by providing information to traffickers on police checks, by warning them of the installation of video surveillance cameras or by delaying the installation of this, by asking the police to avoid checks on certain sectors”
between September 2019 and October 2021, according to the prosecution.
His deputy, in charge of economic development, is suspected of having provided information to traffickers about police checks or of having made his company vehicle available to them.
The case took a new turn in January, when two investigating judges from Bobigny ordered the referral to the criminal court of Mélanie Boulanger, his deputy, as well as 17 other people suspected of being involved in this vast drug trafficking.
The date of the trial has not been specified.
The mayor denies her involvement
The mayor has always denied her involvement in this traffic.
She claimed to have
“no link”
with the drug traffickers in her town, of which she has been mayor since 2014.
“They tried several times to contact me through an intermediary.
I am a grassroots elected official.
They call me, I answer.
They obviously never called me themselves
,” the mayor said.
According to her, the traffickers contacted her to try
“to impress her, to intimidate her, to dissuade her from leading the fight”
against delinquency, during the installation of video surveillance cameras or when she requested additional resources.
“If her statements and the documents she provides show that, publicly, she was trying to fight against drug trafficking in her commune, the investigations demonstrated that at the same time, she “worked” with the Mezianis by providing them with information essential to the sustainability and development of their drug trafficking
,” for its part indicated the prosecution.
“This accusation dirties me and makes me suffer, as much as it damages the image of our city and that of my family”
, reacted this Wednesday February 21 in the press release from the town hall Mélanie Boulanger, who describes
this
“surrealistic”
charge.
“The announcement - on January 12 - of my referral to a criminal court, however, inflicted on me a decompensation that was as unexpected as it was worrying.
Since then, it has been a fight for my health that I have had to lead (...) This medical fight is the only one that is not compatible with the heavy responsibilities of mayor, and that is why I am forced to give it up.”
, she writes.