• This Thursday, the Cahors court judged a hunter at the origin of the shooting which killed Morgan Keane, on December 2, 2020, while he was chopping wood at his home.

  • He appeared alongside the beat director, also prosecuted for "manslaughter".

  • The public prosecutor of Cahors requested two years in prison, including six months against the shooter, and eighteen months, including twelve suspended against the director of the hunt, as well as a permanent ban on hunting. .

    The decision was reserved for January 12.

“I recognize my mistake, I regret it.

Sincerely.

Not a day goes by that I don't think about it, it's etched in my head for life.

These remorse are those expressed bluntly by Julien F., a 35-year-old hunter from Aveyron, at the helm of the Cahors criminal court.

This Thursday, he was tried for fatally wounding Morgan Keane, a 25-year-old young man who was cutting wood a few dozen meters from his house in Calvignac, in the Lot.

For nearly five hours, this tragic day was retraced at the helm, dissected point by point.

The president, Philippe Clarissou, applied himself to return to this hunt for wild boars, pointing out the responsibilities of each, the breaches of the security rules of the director of the hunt, also present on the dock.

“I waited, I aimed, I shot”

Julien F., black shirt, cream pants and growing beard, explains that he had obtained his hunting license only a few months earlier.

An activity that he had decided to practice "to [s] 'aerate the head", says, moved, this father who experienced a tragedy two years earlier, the loss of the daughter of his companion, mowed down by a tractor. driven by a drunk man.

At the request of the magistrate, sometimes awkwardly, he remembers the moment when he fired, at the end of the afternoon, shortly after 4:30 p.m., when the light was dwindling.

“I post myself.

I load my weapon.

First I see a dark mass at the edge.

In my head I tell myself that it's the boar that I missed.

The mace goes up the underbrush, I take aim, then I lower my weapon.

I saw it come down a bit and stop.

It wasn't higher than that,” he mimes, pointing to the level of his knee.

Before adding;

“I waited, I aimed and I fired.

I did not identify the target well, I agree with you, ”he replies to the president of the court, without looking for an escape.



The causal link is clearly established and recognized.

But it remains much more complicated when the issue of hunting conditions is addressed.

The president struggles to determine if the safety instructions were given on the morning of the tragedy, before the start of the hunt for game.

“Some say they have not been repeated, hunters say that as they are seasoned, they know them and do not need explanations.

But when you ask them who their neighbors on the ground are, it's a cacophony.

They say they know the hunting territory, but no one knows which parcels are signed”, asks the president when the director of the hunt is questioned.

The latter, Laurent L., a 52-year-old Lotois, affirms that he clearly stated the rules that morning, “as always”.

But "some don't listen" and sometimes fail to repeat them when questioned, recognizes this farmer.

“But why chase them away?

When you agree to be a hunt director, you have to apply the rules.

There is never a fatality for accidents, they are only due to human error, “said the president again.

But yelling at a hunter, prohibiting him from participating, if he owns hunting grounds, is in a way shooting himself in the foot and depriving himself of plots open to hunting.

"It's tricky," agrees Laurent L.

"Several serious faults" for the prosecutor

All the more delicate as when Philippe Clarissou presents the plan of the premises, we quickly realize that only the small plot where the hunter was was authorized.

It was, however, surrounded by forbidden plots, including that of the Keane family, who over the years had clearly asked hunters to stay away.

"The hunt was carried out almost exclusively on land not signed with the owners, with the exception of the postage stamp where the shooter was", denounced the public prosecutor of Cahors, Alexandre Rossi, not sparing the director of the hunt in his requisitions, noting "several serious faults".

He required eighteen months, twelve of which were suspended against him, and two years, including six months against the shooter.

As well as a permanent ban on hunting.

Mistakes, that day, there were some.

A few hours before the death of Morgan Keane, the main defendant had already fired four times "in the direction of a secondary road", "in delirious conditions in terms of security", loose the president.

"And there were two people in front of him", charges in turn the director of the beat.

While the shooter has acknowledged the facts, he defends himself.

But he is not spared by the public prosecutor, nor by the lawyers of the relatives of the civil parties.

“He had already made three or four dangerous shots, the beat director should have excluded him.

When he posted him there, he didn't give him any firing instructions.

It was a post known by the other hunters, we should have been more vigilant because he did not know the place.

“Hated by anti-hunters and hunters too”

The latter's lawyer explained that her client had never sought to discard.

“He didn't know the land, he understood during the reenactment that the plots around him were prohibited for hunting.

He didn't know there was a house.

What was missed the most were clear and simple instructions, ”acknowledged Sylvie Bros.

“Today, he is hated by anti-hunters and hunters too,” she assured.

Because at the heart of this hearing, even if the different parties deny it, it is a bit hunting and its followers who are at the center of the debates.

“In the Lot, there is no barrier, we go where we want, it's difficult because the hunters no longer have limits.

Morgan's death is not a story to be played around with.

Morgan's life isn't worth much if nothing changes.

It is possible that they killed the hunt themselves, because if we kill men in the hunt, it is the end of a system that we must put back to flat ", pleaded Benoît Coussy, the lawyer for Rowan, the brother of the victim who requested damages.

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