Le Mans: school officials suspected of fraud to help foreign students stay

Europe 1 with AFP // Photo credits: Loïc Venance/AFP 15:53 p.m., November 28, 2023

Three managers of a private business school in Le Mans were indicted on Friday in a case of fraud aimed at obtaining residence permits for foreign students, the Le Mans prosecutor's office announced on Tuesday. The investigation, led by the Nantes Border Police's mobile search brigade, began in April.

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'School documents, without any real basis'

It has "uncovered a major network of aggravated fraud, where managers and managers of a higher education school with a front in Le Mans are suspected of having sold false documents on the letterhead of their institution allowing foreign students to enter or remain on the national territory," the public prosecutor of Le Mans said in a statement. Delphine Dewailly.

The defendants are suspected of having provided "school documents, without any real basis" and "sold at a very high price, sometimes up to several thousand euros, to beneficiaries living in Benin and wishing to obtain the necessary permits to stay in France".

Dozens of students involved

"Several dozen students" are involved, according to documents collected during the searches. "In addition, it appears that this structure created in 2018 would have received public funding in the form of aid for work-study training, again in a fanciful manner and unrelated to its actual activity," the prosecutor added.

Arrested on 20 November in Paris and Le Mans, the three heads of this training institute, aged 42 and 48, one of whom is French and two are Beninese and have no criminal record, were indicted for "aiding the stay of an organised gang, aggravated fraud, breach of trust, misuse of company assets and tax fraud". They were placed under judicial supervision. They face up to 10 years in prison.