Jean-Pierre Bernès, here on the right, during a match at the Vélodrome in 2016 -

FRANCK FIFE / AFP

  • In an order of November 3, the examining magistrate referred a judicial administrator and two relatives of Marseille banditry to the criminal court.

  • These three men are accused of attempted extortion against Jean-Pierre Bernès, the former director of OM who became an agent.

In an order dated November 3, Me Michel Gillibert, a former Marseille receiver appointed by the commercial court, Simon Fedon and Richard Laaban, two men affiliated with local banditry, are referred to the Marseille criminal court for an attempt to extortion in 2015 on Jean-Pierre Bernès, former director of Olympique de Marseille who became a players' agent.

In his order, the examining magistrate estimates that Me Michel Gillibert should recover from Jean-Pierre Bernès a sum of approximately 11 million euros.

Or the amount of damages to which the Aix-en-Provence Court of Appeal had condemned him in 1998 after a trial for embezzlement to the detriment of OM, alongside the president of the Bernard Tapie club at the time.

"Villainous methods"

Before Me Gillibert, other court administrators had, in vain, tried to enter into a transaction with Jean-Pierre Bernès, the latter having always considered this conviction to be unjust.

After a new period of negotiations that had not resulted, Me Gillibert had asked one of his friends, Simon Fedon, 70, to force Jean-Pierre Bernès to agree to compromise to the tune of two million euros.

Recruited to "make an impression" on Jean-Pierre Bernès Bernès, Richard Laaban, 75, had taken part in this negotiation parallel to the official judicial process.

The telephone conversations recorded by the investigators and the sound system of two meals shared between Simon Fedon and Jean-Pierre Bernès led the investigating judge to conclude that there were "villainous methods", justifying an indictment of the three actors in this case for conspiracy.

"If I enter this system, it's racketeering"

It is during these recordings that Simon Fedon evokes a bribe of one million euros to be shared, most of which, according to him, should go to the receiver.

“If I go into this system, it's racketeering… the problem is the liquidator, he's with them, what !!

He's a thug, it's a crazy thing… I'm afraid of these people, ”had confided to his wife, Jean-Pierre Bernès, refusing the market.

Placed in pre-trial detention for four months Me Gillibert has always contested the existence of a bribe.

He justified the use of people whom the examining magistrate said "affiliated with organized crime in Marseille", by his desire to "restore his image" with the commercial court because, in twenty years, none of his predecessors had succeeded. to make Jean-Pierre Bernès pay.

In 2018, Jean-Pierre Bernès and the new ad hoc administrator who took over from Me Gillibert signed a transaction for nearly 2.4 million euros to clear this twenty-year-old debt.

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  • Flight

  • Marseilles

  • Court

  • OM

  • Scam

  • Bernard Tapie

  • Jean-pierre bernes