A police car in Lille.

(illustration) -

PHILIPPE HUGUEN / AFP

  • Until February 12, eight people, including six police officers, are on trial in a vast corruption case based on drug trafficking in the Goutte d'Or district.

  • Brigadier Karim M. is suspected of having organized the racketeering of Goutte d'Or dealers, offering protection to those who paid "insurance", calling out to those who refused.

  • He faces ten years in prison and a million euros fine.

At the criminal court in Paris,

The president, Isabelle Prévost-Desprez, wonders: is Karim M. a police officer or a banker?

The brigadier of the Bac of the 18th arrondissement, who is tried before the 16th chamber of the Paris judicial court since Wednesday, never paid for his purchases by credit card.

In addition, he has not made any cash withdrawals in four years.

Yet he often carried cash with him.

During the search of his home, investigators from the IGPN - the police force - discovered 2,755 euros in cash, including 1,000 euros in 100 bills, nine cell phones, ammunition and winning game tickets for an amount of 2,460 euros.

Cash of dubious origin, which the defendant was probably trying to launder by turning it into a check or bank transfer.

The explanations that Karim M., 47, gives this Tuesday to the court are confused, even laborious.

An astonishing luck in games of chance would have allowed him to finance the purchase of plane tickets to go to Algeria.

In twenty months, he has been there no less than ten times.

However, even his colleagues never saw him play.

“My parents had businesses and in particular a PMU point.

I spent a large part of my free time there and there I played regularly ”, proclaims the defendant with the imposing build.

However, the investigation revealed that he had won only 4,630 euros.

"A plane ticket to Algeria costs only between 150 and 220 euros", he adds.

"Yes, but earnings of 30 euros at PMU, that's not what pays you your ticket", replies the president.

"That's what I call doing the banker"

Karim M. also recognizes that he also sometimes took money from his parents' cash register.

His father, in fact, gave him 19,000 euros to finance the purchase of an apartment in Aubervilliers (Seine-Saint-Denis).

A sum that the latter also claimed to have won at the games.

"I did not know, at that date, the source of the funds given by my father", assures the accused.

He would have discovered later that it was unreported money, which he laundered by buying winning game tickets… "I didn't see the harm because the origin of the money was their business. .

The president recalls that in legal language, this is called an ABS: abuse of social goods.

Other movements of money intrigue the president.

From there to think that it was about cash given by dealers so that he leaves them alone, there is only one step… Karim M. had notably exchanged 2,450 euros in cash against a check from his cousin , received a transfer of 2,000 euros from one of his colleagues in exchange for a cash refund, offered to another who had just sold a shower column on Leboncoin to endorse a check in his name in exchange for cash.

"Are you playing the banker?"

», Asks the president.

"No, it was more to help him," replied the defendant.

"Cashing the check and giving it cash, that's what I call doing the banker, and it's not allowed," said the magistrate.

"His wife is very spendthrift"

He had also received a transfer of 23,000 euros from one of his father's suppliers, who has since been partly reimbursed in cash.

The money was allegedly loaned to him, without any interest, to buy real estate.

“His wife is very spendthrift, he still had this sum that came from the sale of his house, he preferred to lend it to me because he was afraid that she would spend it.

"

The list of financial oddities the court is examining is still long.

There is also this photo found in his things, on which he poses in front of a pile of banknotes.

It was taken, he said, from a "real estate developer in Algeria" because "it is not common" to see so much money.

That day, he accompanied "someone who was going to choose the color of the kitchen".

“With a real estate developer?

»Wonders the president?

"This is a photo that you shouldn't have taken ..."

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  • Police

  • Corruption

  • Paris

  • Justice

  • Trial