- The mayor of Sanary-sur-Mer appears before the Marseille Criminal Court for various financial offenses.
- He is accused in particular of having promoted in 2009 the promotion of his mistress of the time to the post of director general of services, when she had neither the status nor the diplomas.
It is often said that the courts have the air of a theater. This Tuesday, it was perhaps more the case than usual, in the big room of the commercial court of Marseilles, requisitioned for its volumes which make it possible to respect social distancing. The second day of the trial of the sulphurous mayor of Sanary-sur-Mer, Ferdinand Bernhard, worried about various economic and financial offenses, turned into a strange vaudeville, where adultery stories mingle, a municipal organization with the airs of great bazaar and, above all, a questionable promotion. That, in this case, of Sybille B., indicted for concealment of illegal taking of interests and concealment of embezzlement of public funds, alongside her ex-lover. Or the mayor of Sanary sur Mer, accused of favoritism, illegal taking of interest and embezzlement of public funds.
Hired in town hall at the beginning of 2009 as a controller, a position for which she was fully qualified, this forty-something woman found herself in a few months collaborator of the mayor and general manager of services, in the absence of the incumbent of this post for illness A position she held when she had neither the status nor the diploma. A position to which she was promoted by the mayor when she entered into an intimate relationship with the city councilor. A position which has earned him in particular a doubling of his salary, of more than 5,000 euros monthly.
"It is not related"
"The appearances make fear that it is also for your intimate relations with the mayor that you benefited from a promotion as a collaborator of the cabinet then like that which acts as director general of the services", loose the prosecutor. In front of the microphone covered with a blue plastic glove, Coronavirus obliges, Sybille B., in his also blue suit, blond hair raised in a bun, defends his legitimacy at this post, despite a discernible discomfort. "I understand that we wonder, but it is not related," she hammered at the bar.
In front of the gendarmes, in 2015, Sybille B. explained that he had started an extramarital relationship in the summer of 2009 with the mayor of Sanary, who had married her a few years earlier. On September 1, she was officially promoted. But she assures him, if she benefited from a meteoric rise within the town hall of Sanary-sur-Mer, it is only, according to her, by the quality of her work from her arrival in town hall, in particular when she discovers, within the framework of her functions, that the accounts of the municipality are tampered with by the person in charge.
"My husband tells me that it is face powder"
When her husband at the time learned of the affair with the mayor, then of his express promotion, he warned her. "My husband tells me that it is face powder," she declares to the gendarmes. He says it was just for having me and that I was not recruited on my real skills. With hindsight, I tell myself that my husband was probably right. »Words on which she returns to the stand. "With hindsight I asked myself questions, and with hindsight I tell myself that I have no doubts," she says, repeating that her hiring preceded the start of their relationship.
The mayor and Sybille B. have a tumultuous relationship lasting two years. When, after their breakup, Sybille B. tries to “start over with her life” with a recently hired gardener in the town, she feels put in the closet. Charges that the mayor of Sanary-sur-Mer refutes en bloc, for whom this affair is nothing but slander. It must be said that the city councilor finds himself at this bar after the complaint of one of his constituents.
"God forbid"
Before the judges, taken by a blow of heat, the chosen falls the jacket ... and gets carried away in front of what is for him an invention on the mode of the "romance with rose water": "It is completely indecent to consider that a woman can have her career because she had a relationship with someone! The sexagenarian, in charge for 31 years, ensures that "at no time was the choice made because I had feelings with her or a relationship. It was well deserved. "
"When a person has qualities, you must look at these qualities before going to see in the bathroom," says the elected official, who had admitted having already had a romantic relationship with a previous director. By way of conclusion, the mayor explains, with a smile that hardly amuses the public prosecutor, that he is now in a relationship with ... his secretary. But he swears, she will "never" be promoted to director. "God forbid! "
Lille
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Justice
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- Infidelity
- Misappropriation of public funds
- Trial