The prosecutor's office in Roanne, in the Loire, opened an investigation for "endangering the lives of others" after complaints against X of former employees of the Riorges laboratory of AC Environment group, have we learned Thursday from judicial source.
Seven complaints from former employees
This preliminary investigation, opened against X earlier this week, comes following complaints lodged last month by seven former employees of the laboratory of this real estate diagnostic specialist, who accuse their directors of having exposed them for several years to mergers. chloroform much higher than the maximum allowed. The investigations were entrusted to the Roanne Urban Safety Brigade and the Labor Inspectorate.
Twenty other employees and former employees of the laboratory of Gentilly, Val-de-Marne, the same group also filed complaints in October for identical reasons at the public health pole of the parquet floor of Paris. Contacted by AFP, the latter said they are "under analysis". "Management informed us only since March last year that since June 2016, the external control bodies had established that the ambient air of our laboratories contained chloroform concentrations approximately 25 times higher than the limit value of occupational exposure. (OEL), set at 10 mg / m3, "told AFP one of the plaintiffs.
>> READ ALSO - "We took this as a betrayal": employees of the real estate diagnosis complain after being exposed to dangerous substances
"When we asked the management about abnormal smells or symptoms such as migraines, nausea, tiredness or unexplained pain we were told: everything is under control," he says, adding that some are the link between toxic fumes of chloroform, but also ethanol and acetone with the outbreak of miscarriage or hepatitis. The management of AC Environnement acknowledged in a statement "very significant dysfunctions" noted, due to "excess chloroform emissions", which could have affected a hundred people in each of the two laboratories concerned.
However, it attributes the sole responsibility to the former director of the group's laboratories which, according to the latter, had "deliberately and knowingly subtracted this information from the general management".
Chaired by Denis Mora, AC Environnement presents itself as the French leader in asbestos diagnostics and the number one in real estate diagnostics. The group, controlled since April 2018 by the investment fund Abénex, posted last year a turnover of 54 million euros, with 630 employees.