“The objective is to understand: we do not know if this product is dangerous or not”, explains Philippe Courtois, lawyer for the family. The criminal court of Dax (Landes) re-examines this Monday the case of the dead boy suffocated by a piece of Knacki sausage, in a new hearing enriched by an expert report where the company Herta, prosecuted for manslaughter, compared.
Lilian, 2 years and 11 months, died on August 11, 2014 in a campsite in Messanges, on the Landes coast, where the Bordeaux family was staying during their summer vacation. The Herta group is attacked by Florence and Vincent Lerbey, for “involuntary homicide by manifestly deliberate violation of an obligation of safety or prudence” posed by the Consumer Code.
symbolic euro
That day, on returning from the beach with a couple of friends and their children, the mother prepares the meal for the little ones. On the menu, green beans and Knacki sausages that she cuts into thin slices.
After a few mouthfuls, Lilian takes his throat between his hands, he chokes. Florence Lerbey immediately alerts her husband and her friend, a nurse anesthetist. She tries to remove the piece from the baby’s throat, make him cough, practice the Heimlich maneuver and pat him on the back, keeping him flat on his stomach on his knees while the mother calls 15.
Dad also takes him by the feet, upside down. Nothing works. It’s cardiac arrest. The piece of sausage ended up being removed by the nurse using special pliers when the firefighters arrived. Lilian’s parents filed a complaint against Herta, asking for the symbolic euro, to prevent the tragedy from happening again.
Request for expertise to measure the sponginess of Knacki
At the end of the first hearing which took place in January 2021 at the Dax Criminal Court, the prosecution had requested the release of Herta, considering that it was not necessary to “confuse the legal and the emotional “. But the court had ordered an expertise to measure the spongy and sticky character of the Knacki or their swelling in contact with the saliva of the children.
According to the expert, “a set of technical impossibilities” prevent us from concluding that there is a possible danger or, conversely, from ruling it out. “If Herta had an expert who said ‘don’t worry, it’s not dangerous’, believe that we would have had him a long time ago”, attacks Philippe Courtois who asks “to go further in the questions asked to the ‘expert’, like wondering about the ‘recommendations and advice’ written by Herta on the packaging.
The company and its representative did not wish to speak before the hearing.