Three years in prison, including one firm, were required Tuesday against the president of the French Rugby Federation (FFR) Bernard Laporte and the businessman Mohed Altrad, suspected of having forged together a “pact corruption” in 2017.
According to the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF), the strong man of the oval would have, in return for the payment of 180,000 euros in March 2017, made a series of arbitrations favorable to the Altrad group. The prosecution also called on the criminal court to prohibit, for two years, Bernard Laporte from exercising any function in rugby and Mohed Altrad from managing a commercial company. Fines, respectively of 50,000 and 200,000 euros, have been claimed against them.
The defendants, who dispute the facts, “have damaged the probity surrounding French rugby”, justified the financial prosecutor François-Xavier Dulin.
Arbitration favorable to the Altrad group
According to the prosecution, the former coach of the Blues would have made a series of arbitrations favorable to the Altrad group – including the granting of the sponsorship of the XV of France shirt – with whom he had established a “secret” image contract which resulted in the payment without consideration of 180,000 euros at the beginning of 2017. This contract constitutes the “original sin”, estimated the other financial prosecutor, Céline Guillet, listing “obscure negotiation conditions” and an “unusual amount” of compensation and recalling that Bernard Laporte will not have performed any of the services listed in this agreement.
According to the prosecutor, the boss of French rugby will, on the other hand, have carried out “atypical” and “problematic” interventions for the benefit of the interests of Mohed Altrad, his group and his Montpellier rugby club (MHR), of which he is the president. . “Bernard Laporte was blinded by his private interests within the Altrad group”, added François-Xavier Dulin.
The prosecution notably retained the intervention, at the end of June 2017, of Mr. Laporte with the appeal commission of the FFR, statutorily independent, which would have had the effect of alleviating the disciplinary sanctions imposed on the MHR. The “cardinal principles of sport” were then flouted, according to François-Xavier Dulin.
No “impartial procedure” according to prosecutors
The prosecutors also denounced the conditions for granting the sponsorship of the XV of France jersey to the Altrad group, for 6.8 million euros per year, which would not have given rise to “an impartial procedure”. “We understood that the code of ethics (of the FFR) was not Bernard Laporte’s bedside book”, slashed Céline Guillet.
Two years in prison, one of which is suspended, have also been requested against Claude Atcher, recently dismissed from his position as director of the organization of the Mondial-2023, who is suspected of having received unjustified sums from the FFR on the sidelines of the award of this competition to France.