MAY 1ST VIOLENCE

ALEXANDRE BENALLA CONDEMNED

AT THREE YEARS IN PRISON WITH A FARM

The former Elysee mission manager was sentenced to three years in prison, including a farm with an electronic bracelet and a five-year ban on practicing in the public service, in particular for "willful violence in meetings", "port of 'prohibited weapon' and 'use of diplomatic passports' in the case of the violence of May 1, 2018.

The prosecution had required 18 months suspended imprisonment against Alexandre Benalla, now 30 years old.

Throughout the trial, he defended his innocence on almost all of the facts.

"The court judges that only a mixed sentence is likely to mark the gravity of the facts", explained the president of the court, Isabelle Prévost-Desprez, who underlines the "feeling of impunity and omnipotence" of the defendant.

"You have been invested with a certain power, real with regard to your functions, supposed because of your proximity to the President of the Republic", declared the president of the court Isabelle Prévost-Desprez while pronouncing the judgment.

"You have betrayed the trust placed in you by this appointment," she continued.

The court chose this sentence "in view of the seriousness of the multiple facts, the missions you carried out, which required rigor and exemplarity from you, your unbearable behavior in the social body".

Three other proceedings in progress

In addition to this trial, three other legal proceedings concerning him are still ongoing. One concerns suspicions of “corruption” in a contract between Vincent Crase's company, Mars, and a sulphurous Russian oligarch. A second concerns the mysterious safe he had at his home.

Finally, the third concerns suspicion of "false testimony" before the Senate commission of inquiry.

Lighter sentences for other defendants

During the trial in September, the prosecution requested suspended sentences of two to twelve months against his co-convicts, the ex-employee of En Marche! Vincent Crase and two police officers.

Vincent Crase, a 48-year-old reservist gendarme, was sentenced to two years in prison.

The two police officers from the Paris police headquarters, Maxence Creusat and Laurent Simonin, tried for having transmitted CCTV images to Alexandre Benalla, were respectively sentenced to a 500-euro fine and a three-month suspended prison sentence, without registration for the two in the criminal record.

Prolix at the helm, Alexandre Benalla had assured to have been "lawful, loyal, honest" and contested any "voluntary violence"...