A complaint was filed against the Minister of Justice Éric Dupond-Moretti for “threats” and “psychological violence” by the lawyer Nathalie Tomasini, who notably defended Jacqueline Sauvage, for facts which occurred in 2020 during a trial in Normandy, confirmed the prosecution on Wednesday.

Denouncing an "attempt at blackmail", the entourage of the minister, appointed to this post in July 2020, said that Eric Dupond-Moretti was considering a complaint for slanderous denunciation.

"Dirty whores"

Evreux prosecutor Dominique Puechmaille said she had not yet taken a decision on the follow-up to be given to this complaint. “I'm not sure the advanced tort qualifications hold. And I wonder about a possible prescription if we were faced with insults and the facts were proven, ”detailed the magistrate. Me Tomasini accuses the Minister of having insulted her, as well as a colleague, during a spousal homicide trial before the Assize Court of Evreux.

Eric Dupond-Moretti, who defended the accused, would have qualified the two lawyers of the civil parties of "shame of the bar", "traders of misfortune", of "hysterics" and of "filthy whores", according to a copy of this complaint.

In this document, the magistrate Brigitte Blind, representative of the prosecution at the trial, attests to having seen Eric Dupond-Moretti "vociferating in the direction of the lawyers of the civil parties while shaking his fist towards them".

One of the civil parties also evokes an “outburst of verbal and gestural violence” by Eric Dupond-Moretti.

"We did everything to prevent me from filing this complaint"

The minister's entourage considered that "this late complaint" was "only the result of an attempt at blackmail that did not work" and that it was akin to "political instrumentalisation". “Since November 2020, while Eric Dupond-Moretti has always denied having uttered the insults, gestures or threats of which he is slanderously accused, (the complainant) has tried on several occasions to take advantage of it to integrate, against his silence , commissions launched by the Keeper of the Seals, ”says the same source.

"This is totally false," retorted Me Tomasini.

“He's reversing the story.

We did everything to prevent me from filing this complaint.

I was offered everything, ”added the lawyer who claims one euro in damages.

The minister is also surprised that his colleague "did not immediately report" the facts to the president of the Assize Court, to the local president and to his president.

Me Tomasini specified that he had filed an ethics complaint with the Council of the Bar Association in March 2020 and had waited for the end of another media trial in June 2021, to file a criminal complaint.

“I didn't want business to collide,” she said.

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  • Violence

  • Threatens

  • Eric Dupond-Moretti

  • Complaint

  • Government

  • Justice