The ex-priest Bernard Preynat was sentenced, Monday March 16, to five years in prison for sexual assaults committed in the past on young scouts in the diocese of Lyon.

The judgment of the criminal court does not order a warrant of deposit, according to the lawyer of the former priest, Me Frédéric Doyez. This sentence is lower than the requisitions of the public prosecutor who had demanded at least eight years in prison for the accused, 75 years old, during his trial in January.

This judgment was delivered in a courthouse closed to the public and the press, the doors of the courts being closed from Monday because of the epidemic of new coronavirus except for the treatment of "essential litigation", had announced Sunday the Keeper of the Seals Nicole Belloubet.

"Silence of the Church"

Bernard Preynat, defrocked in mid-2019 at the end of his canonical trial, was present at the deliberations.

At the hearing, prosecutor Dominique Sauves accused the former chaplain of "breaking" the lives of Boy Scouts aged 7 to 15 and of "using the parents' silence and the Church's silence" to increase its abuse in Sainte-Foy-lès-Lyon (Rhône) and during camps abroad between 1971 and 1991.

Bernard Preynat, kept in office by the diocese of Lyon until the fall of 2015 when his actions had been known for a long time, had asked for forgiveness from the nine victims who came to testify about their suffering - many others were unable to file complaints prescribes - arguing that since 1991, he has not touched any children.

His trial was eagerly awaited since the explosion of the case at the end of 2015 after an initial filing of a complaint which splashed the entire Catholic hierarchy through Cardinal Philippe Barbarin.

Condemned last year for his silences over the affair, the former archbishop of Lyon has since been released on appeal and has resigned.

With AFP

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