"He ate a bowl of rice, a slice of ham": accused of embezzlement for meals offered by the community to the mayor of Toulon Hubert Falco, himself tried for concealment, the former president of the Var department assured Tuesday ignoring their illegality.
Sitting at the bar due to knee pain, Marc Giraud, 71, does not dispute, before the Marseille Criminal Court, the meals taken by Mr. Falco at noon in the cafeteria of the departmental council, "in full view from everyone".
"A bowl of rice, a slice of ham and a glass of water is not an epicurean", he underlines, recalling that elected officials have lunch for free in their community. "And I would have imagined that it wasn't legal? I had seen him in the cafeteria for thirteen years," he continues, introducing himself as a "30-year-old friend" of Hubert Falco.
Opened on Tuesday, the so-called "Falco fridge" trial, where the mayor of Toulon is accused of concealment of embezzlement of public funds for meals supposedly paid for by the Var departmental council for three years - facts which he denies --, is due to end on Friday.
In total, the cost of private meals served to Mr. Falco and his wife, from the department's budget, would have amounted to at least 64,500 euros over the period covered, between 2015 and 2018, according to investigators.
Mayor of Toulon since 2001, Mr. Falco, 75, ex-LR now rallied to President Emmanuel Macron, had also led the department of Var, from 1994 to 2002. Then he remained its honorary president.
"What embezzlement did I do?" Launched Marc Giraud, president of the department from 2015 to 2022, on Tuesday, before having to give up his chair in 2022, after being convicted of embezzlement of public funds in a case of fictitious employment.
"I was aware of nothing", repeated this former firefighter who fell into politics "out of passion" in 1995. Thus, he would never have been informed of the noises circulating on a fridge dedicated to dinners and weekend meals. -end for Hubert Falco, no more than taking over the account of a public contract for the laundry costs of the mayor of Toulon.
"Do you think the president should be concerned about a pressing market?" he asked.
But the president of the court, Céline Ballerini, confronted the former elected official with several emails exchanged by his department directors on the payment of the food costs of the mayor of Toulon.
“Everyone was aware in my hierarchy,” had written the deputy director of the direction of events and means of support. This manager is one of three executives to have been sentenced in March 2022 for embezzlement of public funds, to a suspended fine of 10,000 euros, on prior recognition of his guilt.
This same manager had also confirmed that the community would take charge of the laundry costs of the elected official and his lunches, evening meals, weekends and public holidays, ensuring that he had not reported the facts by " fear of reprisals".
All "liars", replied Marc Giraud, who insisted on not being "aware of anything": "They never came knocking on my door. Radio silence!"
The court will hear Hubert Falco on Wednesday, before the hearing of the twenty witnesses called by his defense.
"For Hubert Falco, it's very hard to appear when you have been exemplary all your life," his lawyer, Me Thierry Fradet, pleaded on Tuesday morning: "But there is also a relief, because we will finally be able to develop our arguments. ".
"A real organization has been set up, (...) it's obsessive, there are all the symptoms of Falcomania", continued the lawyer, referring in particular to the work of certain journalists or a trade unionist of the county council.
11/04/2023 20:46:54 - Marseille (AFP) © 2023 AFP
