A search was carried out at the town hall of Baie-Mahault as part of an investigation into suspicions of embezzlement of public funds targeting the president of the Guadeloupe region, former deputy and former mayor of this city Ary Chalus (ex-LREM ), we learned on Wednesday from a judicial source.
The search was carried out on Tuesday as part of an investigation opened in July 2019 by the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF) following a report from the High Authority for the transparency of public life (HATPV). This investigation was entrusted to the brigade for the repression of economic crime (BRDE) of the Paris police headquarters.
Misappropriation of mandate fees
In October 2018, the PNF had received 14 reports from the HATPV concerning six deputies including Ary Chalus, elected to the National Assembly from 2012 to 2017, and eight senators. These parliamentarians were suspected of having embezzled, between the end of 2015 and June 2017, all or part of their representative allowance for mandate expenses, according to a note from the PNF dated February 2022 and published on its website.
At the time of his questioning via this report, Ary Chalus had indicated that he had made the “choice of delegated management subject to a mandate given to the financial and social management department of the National Assembly” .
Ary Chalus, 61, has chaired the regional council of Guadeloupe since December 2015, after having been mayor of Baie-Mahault for fourteen years. He is due to appear in court next October on suspicion of fraudulently exceeding the ceiling of his campaign accounts for the 2015 regional elections.