An investigating judge referred for indictment on eleven charges. The case, against a backdrop of alleged links with Corsican banditry, is not common. 20 minutes make the point.
Who is the magistrate in question?
Hélène Gerhards, 49, appeared at the very beginning of her career in the documentary “ The Judge and the dioxin affair “. She was then an investigating judge in Albertville, one of her very first positions after the judicial school, from which she graduated in 2001. And therefore, the media judge of the dioxin affair, on the broadcasts of toxic fumes from the Gilly-sur-Isère incineration plant in Savoie, the trial of which will leave a bitter taste for the civil parties: “In the background appeared the trial of an investigation under high media exposure and low legal security, carried out by judge Hélène Gerhards-Lastera”, written in The worldlegal columnist Pascale Robert-Diard.
In July 2008, Hélène Gerhards was appointed investigating judge in Marseille where she stayed for almost three years before moving to Corsica, between 2011 and 2016. Hélène Gerhards was then appointed vice-prosecutor in Toulouse then, in 2021, at the court Agen appeal. “For her supporters”, Hélène Gerhards, is “a methodical and hardworking judge, who likes to listen to Bach while working on her files”, reports Mediapartwhich revealed the magistrate’s custody.
In a trial report in 2014, on a shooting in Sartène in Corsica, Release also recounts that the magistrate was summoned by the lawyer of one of the accused, so that she could explain her instructions. The daily notes that “her answers are skillful, precise”, even if, at first, “she seems tense on this side of the bar”.
What is he accused of?
The magistrate today at the Agen Court of Appeal is accused of “a close relationship” with the world of Corsican banditry, and in particular Johann Carta, who is an alleged figure. It is also on the sidelines of the investigations into the Petit Bar gang, during telephone tapping carried out by the Marseille justice system, that the name of “the judge” appears. We talk about work that he would supervise in the judge’s villa, located in the bay of Ajaccio and estimated at 2 million euros. Swimming pool, spa, pool house, said villa has ten rooms and an exotic garden. A question torments the investigators: what could have been the counterparts of the links established between the judge and the Corsican environment?
Furthermore, “the old garage has been transformed into accommodation accessible on Airbnb,” says The world. However, to the tax authorities, she only declares a house and a garage. Likewise, she claims to be domiciled in Corsica, as single with her three children, while she lives as a husband in Agen. Among the eleven counts presented to the investigating judge for his indictment, there are the embezzlement of public funds by a person holding public authority, the use of the services of a person carrying out hidden work in an organized gang or even influence peddling and money laundering.
Judge Gerhards confirmed at the end of March Mediapart her links with Johann Carta for his site, but she assures that he had been presented to her simply as “Johann” by a craftsman also mobilized on his site and that she had not made the link with the Petit Bar gang.
What are his alleged links with Dupond-Morretti ?
If the investigation is most sensitive, it is also because of the judge’s alleged proximity to the current Minister of Justice Éric Dupond-Moretti. According to Mediapart, Hélène Gerhards was notably a supporter in the case opposing him in 2017 to Marie-Laure Piazza, when the latter was the president of the Assize Court of Bastia and, he, the tenor of the bars implicated for having intimidated her. Éric Dupond-Moretti even suggested that he join his law firm.