“Call me a fool, a fool… Now I’m MacGyver!” That Karine Lacombe is awarding me the craziest man award is not very nice. But that’s on the other side of the white line. To say that someone gave false testimony before the National Assembly is unbearable. “At the helm of the Marseille Criminal Court, Didier Raoult does not hide his annoyance. This Friday morning, the famous Marseille professor appeared before the 11th correctional chamber, as a civil party in a defamation case which opposed him to Karine Lacombe and Europe 1. During an interview granted in July 2020 to the radio, the infectiologist and head of the infectious diseases department at Saint-Antoine Hospital (AP-HP) had in fact declared that, “legal actions [contre Didier Raoult N.D.L.R.] for lying before the parliamentary commission are ongoing”.
The doctor was referring to Didier Raoult’s hearing by the National Assembly a few weeks earlier, during which the director of the IHU at the time claimed that the death rate linked to the coronavirus was higher in Paris than ‘in Marseille. Between the lines is also a letter from Martin Hirsch, the director of the AP-HP, sent a few days after the hearing of the Marseilles professor, to the President of the National Assembly in which he considered that the words of Didier Raoult “seemed amount to false testimony”. Statements which led Didier Raoult to file a complaint against Martin Hirsch for “slanderous denunciation”.
Didier Raoult came down from his pedestal
“I did not lie in front of the National Assembly, plague Didier Raoult at the helm. I am not crazy. I am registered. “And to add:” I do not watch television. I don’t listen to the radio. I don’t read the general press. But when I learned that, it was the straw that broke the camel’s back. There is a limit to telling on the airwaves that Mr. Raoult is lying in front of the National Assembly. That’s too much. »
“The problem is not so much to have spoken of “lies”, it is to make people think that there were legal actions in progress”, something which “remains in the ear of the listener “, according to Didier Raoult’s lawyer, Me Brice Grazzini. For the latter, the moral damage of his client is “enormous”. “I’m talking about the students. I’m talking about other teachers. I’m talking about the world of science. It is said that Didier Raoult came down from his pedestal, he, one of the most published researchers in the world. It is systematically attacked. It opened the doors to so many things. It was the starting signal for so many things behind. All this continues today and I cannot evaluate it. I therefore ask you to dismiss on civil interest. The lawyer also claimed the payment of 10,000 euros on a provisional basis for his client
“It seems to me that Didier Raoult infringes freedom of expression by prohibiting any form of criticism of the scientific proposals he has proposed, even though Madame Lacombe is systematically the object of attacks which call into question her scientific probity. “, retorts the lawyer of the infectiologist, Me Maud Sobel. And to accuse Eric Chabrière, a relative of Didier Raoult, of harassing his client daily on social networks since the filing of a complaint. “He threatens her, says she’s not very ‘fut fut’. A prose unworthy of the scientific community, and even of the hand of a teenager on Twitter. The lawyers for Karine Lacombe and Europe 1 requested release. The court will deliver its deliberation on November 22.