“We take false statements at face value and the machine goes into overdrive” | EUROtoday

“I thought she had been the victim of violence”

Among the comments on […] Dirty bitch we're going to come back and fuck you like at the height of our blockades […] You are all guilty and complicit. Strength to you and your sisters (sic).” After listening to the principal and the rectorate advisor both say on the stand how much they had been traumatized by these threats, no longer daring to appear in public, take public transport or take their children to school , the defendant apologized and indicated that he had “acted under the influence of emotion”. “When I saw the student’s post I thought that she had been the victim of violence,” he said, without being able to fully recognize that she could have lied.

“We are in the middle of virtual reality where anyone can say anything, invent themselves as a victim of discrimination in front of a pack who with blows of like will attack people entrusted with public service missions. We take the lying comments of a high school student at face value and the machine goes into overdrive,” denounced Me Florence Lec, civil party to the trial, recalling what the dramatic consequences of such actions in the past could have been.

Alert about a lie

In her submissions, the prosecutor returned to the difficulties that teachers and school leaders have in enforcing the law on secularism. Especially since at the time of the events, the Attal circular on respect for the values ​​of the Republic banning the abaya had not yet been published.

As for Meissa S., the representative of the public prosecutor, insists on the fact that rather than appealing her exclusion, the young woman chose to alert on social networks what she describes as an injustice. “But when we have had so many interviews, several temporary exclusions on the subject without the behavior changing, it is difficult to say that she was not aware that this decision was going to be taken, difficult to be surprised,” argues the prosecutor.

By speaking out on TikTok and Twitter, the student knew “perfectly” that there would be “consequences”. “She provoked the harassment, supposedly to alert, but to alert on a lie,” warned the prosecutor, asking for a six-month suspended prison sentence and a citizenship course for the young woman. carry out at your own expense with an online hate module. Against Jules L., she requested a five-month suspended prison sentence and the completion of a similar internship.

An absent defendant

Tried for “death threats”, “threat to commit a crime or misdemeanor against persons entrusted with a public service mission”, “cyberharassment resulting in an ITT of more than 8 days on a person entrusted with a public service mission” and “disclosure personal information enabling the identification or location of a person and exposing them to a direct risk of harm to the person or property”, the defendants confronted penalties of as much as 5 years of imprisonment.

Finally, it was the flip of Meissa B.'s protection to talk. Me Nabil Boudi tried to clarify to the president and the assessors that the intentional aspect was not characterised. In different phrases, that Meissa B. had not voluntarily and deliberately thrown away the names of the 2 complainants. He defined that these reactions on social networks have been the actions of a younger lady “humiliated” by having been excluded. A phrase that’s tough to listen to, although her consumer didn’t seem on the listening to and was due to this fact unable to offer explanations in regards to the details with which she is accused, or to formulate the slightest excuse. in the direction of the victims.

An absence regretted by all events, and which frequently has, in such circumstances, penalties on the content material of the judgment. Me Boudi justified this absence by the “trauma” skilled by his consumer on this case. Judgment is due on July 5.