Defending Wallerand de Saint-Just, the treasurer of the National Front (FN) on whom a big a part of the accusation rests within the attraction trial of the occasion’s European parliamentary assistants, was actually not a straightforward process. Mᵉ Henri Laquay obtained away with it, Tuesday February 10, with conciseness, finesse and humor, even when his consumer’s legal views don’t essentially incline to jokes.
Mr. de Saint-Just, 75 years outdated, former lawyer, was treasurer of the occasion from 2009 to 2021, and was sentenced on March 31, 2025 for “complicity in embezzlement of public funds” (to the tune of three.1 million euros) to a few years in jail, two of which had been suspended, a effective of fifty,000 euros and three years of ineligibility. He, for the court docket, performed “a determining role” to allow “save money thanks to the European Parliament”.
A ” system “ would have been arrange by Jean-Marie Le Pen, then developed by his daughter Marine, to pay occasion activists, “under the cover of fictitious parliamentary assistant contracts”. The system, for the court docket, “there is no doubt”. “To say that there was no system would be a bit crude, attacked the Brussels lawyer. I’m going to be a little rude. » He readily acknowledges that assistants, “in a proportion difficult to define”have actually labored for the FN and never just for their deputy, however that doesn’t make a system, particularly for the reason that guidelines of the European Parliament “evolved over time and were not very clear”.
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https://www.lemonde.fr/politique/article/2026/02/10/au-proces-en-appel-des-assistants-parlementaires-du-fn-un-systeme-qui-n-a-pas-ete-serieusement-mis-en-uvre-et-n-a-pas-atteint-l-objectif-fixe_6666208_823448.html