The announcement fell around 7:30 p.m. Tuesday.
In a press release, the LR mayor of Saint-Etienne Gaël Perdriau indicates that he has "put an end to the functions" of his chief of staff at the town hall but also in the metropolis.
The decision was taken after a meeting with the elected representatives of the majority and the mayors who sit on the metropolitan office.
“At the end of these consultations, it seemed necessary to me” to do so in order “to allow municipal and metropolitan work to continue with serenity”, justifies Gaël Perdriau, specifying that the person concerned, Pierre Gauttieri, “understood the stakes of this decision and accepted them".
He, on the other hand, rules out resigning.
The two men are suspected of being involved in a sextape blackmail, revealed by the Mediapart site.
Presumption of innocence
Gilles Artigues, former first deputy of the town hall of Saint-Etienne, accuses them of having trapped him during a meeting organized with an escort-boy in a hotel, in 2014, with a view to blackmailing him.
The massage session, which he received, was filmed.
In excerpts of conversations recorded by the person concerned some time later, we hear Gaël Perdriau and his chief of staff threatening the father of the family to broadcast the video if the idea came to him to file a complaint.
"I remind you that Mr. Pierre Gauttieri, like me and like each of our fellow citizens, benefits from this essential guarantee of democracy which is the presumption of innocence", concludes the mayor of Saint-Etienne who has always denied being the sponsor of this video.
The investigation was entrusted to the PJ of Lyon.
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Company
Blackmail
sextape
Saint Etienne
Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes