Wood cut here and there in plots that belong to others, then resold. This is the scheme for which a former leader of a forestry group is being prosecuted before the court in Thionville (Moselle). The prosecution demanded three years in prison on Monday, two of which were suspended, against the defendant, accused of having cut and resold wood not belonging to him, for damage estimated at 500,000 euros.
According to the deputy prosecutor, Valérie Kondratuk, Pierre A. used his position as an agent of the regional delegation of the National Center for Forest Property (CNPF), a public establishment, to acquire plots from around fifty owners. private companies “for the benefit” of his forestry group company, while he claimed to be advising them.
He only “built up a forest heritage”, according to the defendant’s lawyer
Thanks to his access to the CNPF database listing forest owners, he was able to identify which ones had died, did not live in the area or “would not come to claim anything” to then sell the wood from their plots, described the magistrate.
Heavy requisitions, for one of the defense lawyers, Me Pascal Bernard, according to whom the prosecution has “not demonstrated the scam”. Pleading for release, Me Yves Stella also considered that his client had only “built up a forest heritage”, and was able to make “mistakes” in marking and delimiting the plots to be cut, without the sale of wood does not constitute a “criminal offence”. Public agent within the CNPF and at the same time private manager of a forestry group, Pierre A. did not want to reveal the turnover of his commercial company at the hearing.
Luxury cars seized
A “problem of mixing genres”, according to the president, Jacques Ciampi. The defendant then replied that he had bought plots out of “passion for the forest”, “like many people in the forestry sector”.
After apologizing, he also admitted to having “slipped” and cut trees on plots that did not belong to him, pushed by the “rise in timber prices” and at the request of timber traders who “put the pressure”, he justified himself before the court. “I made money but reinvested it,” he added. “In cars! exclaimed a person in the victim’s bench.
Three luxury cars had been seized from the defendant last December, during his arrest. “It is not in the ethics of our establishment to sell the property of others”, lamented Alain Lefeuvre, director of the Grand-Est regional delegation of the CNPF.
Judgment has been reserved for January 23.