I’story of a Machiavellian revenge has just found its outcome in the judicial court of Troyes. The victim, a gendarme from the Aube department, did not understand why, on February 8, 2019, he was caught in the act of speeding in Maizières-la-Grande-Paroisse. Because, as our colleagues fromis lightning, he was, like his wife, at his place of work. Not behind the wheel, therefore, of his vehicle.
After examining the picture, the investigators note a slight difference. The make and model of the vehicle correspond, as does the license plate, except for one detail: the plate of the policeman’s vehicle bears the acronym of Champagne-Ardenne when, in the photo, we notice that of the Grand Est. The plate is therefore false. By observing CCTV footage, investigators observe strange behavior, as if the driver had deliberately accelerated to be flashed by the radar.
One year suspended sentence
An identical vehicle without a license plate was found not far away by the gendarmes, in the parking lot of a garage near the town of Romilly-sur-Seine. The manager of the establishment is known to have multiplied speeding and suffered a license suspension of several months in 2018. The gendarme at the heart of the case was part of the team present on the day of the control which led to the suspension.
READ ALSOThey get the cancellation of a million euros in fines
After several months of stagnation partly due to the disappearance of the CCTV images, deleted the day before the request, because too old, a former employee of the garage is advancing the investigation. He brings a picture of the fake license plate stored in the garage. But it is another discovery that will lead the gendarmes to raise the truth: the mechanic would have obtained the plate number of the personal vehicle of the victim via another gendarme. “A friend of thirty years” of the mechanic, he will explain. The mechanic denies it in court without being able to convince. He was sentenced to a one-year suspended prison sentence for “usurpation of the plate”, “driving despite a license suspension” and “concealment of violation of professional secrecy”.