The one-year prison sentence of a former notary from Var for endangering the tenants of one of his run-down buildings in the northern districts of Marseille was confirmed on appeal on Wednesday.
The Aix-en-Provence Court of Appeal also imposed a fine of 30,000 euros on Pierre-Yves Loiseau, 44, and a ten-year ban on purchasing residential property.
She sentenced the SCI owner of the building which was confiscated to a fine of 100,000 euros. And it reduced from 25,000 to 15,000 euros the amount of damages that Pierre-Yves Loiseau will have to pay to two former occupants.
Denouncing “an unreasonable search for profit”, the court however took into account the project of employment as a lawyer mentioned by the former ministerial officer during the hearing, and “a beginning of awareness”, to order that the year of detention is served under an electronic bracelet at home.
Between 2006 and 2009, via 23 SCIs, Pierre-Yves Loiseau acquired real estate assets valued at four million euros.
“No legitimate reason not to carry out this work”
The building at 315 rue de Lyon, in Marseille, made up of 11 apartments and three businesses, was the subject of unsanitary and then dangerous orders in 2012 as well as formal notices to carry out work.
The owner did not cite “any legitimate reason for not carrying out this work” and “it was deliberately that he chose to leave the building in a state of disrepair”, specified the president of the courtyard, Fabrice Naudé.
Mr. Loiseau explained that he had contacted five companies but “his requests were inconsistent to urgently remedy the disorder”, the court ruled.
“A fallen golden boy”
Through a snowball effect and inability to repay the loans taken out, his assets went down the drain, causing other bans on living.
He also appeared in early November before the criminal court for refusing to carry out the work and rehouse his tenants from four other degraded buildings.
The prosecutor then described him as “a fallen golden boy who thought he was doing good business”, “not a real slumlord, rather a totally negligent owner”. The magistrate requested three years in prison, two of which were suspended, and a fine of 50,000 euros as well as two fines of 100,000 and 300,000 euros against two other of his SCIs as well as the confiscation of a building.
The judgment is expected on January 10.