He assures him: no, he is not the "sponsor" of the video filming the former first deputy mayor in the company of another man, in a hotel room.
The chief of staff of the mayor LR of Saint-Étienne, Pierre Gauttieri, ruled out resigning on Wednesday, the day after his police custody.
Mayor Gabriel Perdriau was also placed in police custody on Tuesday as part of the investigations into the filming and use of a video shot in 2014 in which we see Gilles Artigues, his former first deputy and ex-deputy known for his Catholic commitment, to be massaged by a man.
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“Neither the mayor nor I are the sponsors of this video,” said the chief of staff in an interview broadcast Wednesday on the local television channel TL7.
“I am calm about the following events”, he assured, wishing to apologize to the family of Gilles Artigues, his own family, the elected officials of the city and the inhabitants.
Regarding overwhelming audio recordings published Monday by Mediapart, Pierre Gauttieri said he was "shattered with shame" by his own words, pronounced according to him "in a moment of anger, bewilderment".
“I have a video showing you the ass in the air with a guy.
It does not bother you ?
he says in this recording made during a meeting with the mayor in July 2018.
Their resignations demanded
At the same time, a hundred people demonstrated in the rain in front of the town hall to demand his resignation, that of the mayor and the deputy for education, also incriminated in this affair.
Several local elected officials have already called on the mayor and his team to step back, while LR launched an exclusion procedure against him.
On Wednesday, the Medef de la Loire and three other employers' organizations published a press release denouncing "practices outside of any republican and managerial ethics".
"We wish to strongly challenge the elected officials of Saint-Étienne Métropole and the City on the need and urgency to take the necessary measures so that governance regains serenity, teamwork and exemplarity", says this press release.
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The affair erupted at the end of August when the Mediapart news site published the detailed confessions of a former close friend of the municipal team on a "smearing of morals" organized according to him at the request of the mayor and his relatives.
The Lyon public prosecutor's office opened a judicial investigation for "invasion of privacy, aggravated blackmail, embezzlement of public property by a person in charge of a public function, breach of trust and concealment of these offenses" after a complaint by Gilles Artigues.
