Draveil (France) (AFP)
They still speak of "his great aura", "his court", "his influence": the day after the conviction and imprisonment of Georges Tron for rape and sexual assault, residents of Draveil describe their mayor as "a man of power. "with sometimes" unhealthy "behavior.
On the right bank of the Seine, Georges Tron (LR) reigned for more than a quarter of a century over the 1,578 hectares of Draveil, a mainly residential town, 25 kilometers from Paris.
But Wednesday evening, the former deputy and secretary of state was sentenced on appeal to five years in prison, three of which were closed for rape and sexual assault on a former collaborator at the town hall, accompanied by six years of ineligibility.
His lawyer Me Antoine Vey announced Thursday evening his cassation appeal.
A rebound that many Draveillois did not expect, after a ten-year-long judicial drama, marked by his resignation from the Fillon government in 2011 and a first trial in 2018 which ended with an acquittal ...
Thursday, the city digests the news again.
Between the market stalls, near the town hall, the hearts of the inhabitants swing.
"It's a blow to the city", told AFP the manager of a real estate agency, working for twenty years in Draveil and preferring anonymity.
"He had a great aura", he adds, before portraying him as "a very royalist man of power (...)", "a politician with a relatively authoritarian court".
"I think that justice has been done," said a client, Elisabeth, 65, who has lived in Draveil for more than thirty years, however regretting the departure of "a good mayor, close to the inhabitants, who has done a lot for the city" .
Former elected to the municipal council, Anne-Marie Martin-Carmagnac, now an LFI activist, describes "a very jovial man, with a presence such that he could impress those around him".
"I always relied on justice," she said. "He had a court around him and people still defend him."
- "You had to show your feet" -
The town hall of Draveil, a large white building surrounded by railings, was closed to the public on Thursday.
Contacted by AFP, Richard Privat, the first deputy mayor, indicated "not wanting to communicate on this affair".
Only one elected by the majority affirmed - anonymously - that the municipal team remained "very united" and that the current affairs of the municipality of 30,000 inhabitants would be "perfectly managed".
As for the employees, silence is the order of the day.
In front of a municipal building, ten of them, on a cigarette break, refused to testify.
Foot massages, clandestine recordings, lies and "omerta", crude descriptions of triolic sex scenes: the microcosm of the town hall was widely described during the four weeks of the appeal hearing.
According to the civil parties, "Mr. Mayor", tall, elegant, his long gray hair pulled back, had used his power and his presence to constitute a "municipal harem" by offering a job to women in his town .
A follower of plantar reflexology, the mayor has always denied any sexual connotation to the foot massages he lavished on the women around him.
"I have always been very questioning about his foot handling practices, it has always been unhealthy", comments soberly the former municipal councilor Ms. Martin-Carmagnac.
"It was known that, to have something, you had to show your feet!", Says, more directly, a shopkeeper in the city, Corinne.
Daphné Ract-Madoux, opponent of Mr. Tron during the legislative elections of 2012 and current Modem municipal councilor of Itteville (Essonne), evokes, for her, "the hold" of a mayor whom she describes as "brilliant speaker" his verve "in the service of obscure behavior".
At the trial, she herself testified to having suffered "foot massages", not consented to, by the mayor during an interview with him.
Who will replace Mr. Tron?
The elected officials do not respond but according to the General Code of Local Authorities (CGCT), "the mayor is temporarily replaced in the fullness of his functions by a deputy, in the order of the appointments".
"Justice has spoken, elected officials must be exemplary", concluded in a press release the president of Essonne, François Durovray (LR).
ali-amd-ola-clw / pa / pb
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