Magazines talker and Current values, prosecuted for defamation for articles on a criminal conviction of filmmaker Ladj Ly, were released on Wednesday, April 13, in Paris. The director of “Miserables” will call.
The case dates back to December 17, 2019, a few days before the Oscars ceremony for which Ladj Ly’s film, jury prize at the Cannes Film Festival and success in theaters, had been selected to represent France. That day, talker published an article on its website, taken up by the ultra-conservative weekly Current valuesentitled : “Ladj Ly was imprisoned for complicity in attempted murder”.
Ladj Ly was sentenced in 2011 to three years in prison for “kidnapping and forcible confinement” and not for “complicity in attempted murder”, after a punitive expedition carried out in January 2009 with two men, a case in which he has always claimed his innocence. The investigation showed that he had not participated in the violence against the victim. In 2012, the court of appeal reduced the sentence to three years in prison, one of which was suspended.
An “error confined to the sole qualification of the facts”
In its judgment on Wednesday, the court dismissed the lawsuits for defamation because of the real or supposed affiliation to a religion, included in the complaint of the artist. For the rest, the press chamber considered that some of the remarks were indeed defamatory and stressed that the article contained a ” error “.
She nevertheless considered that the defendants should be released, because the journalist, author of the article, benefited from a “sufficient factual basis”, namely court decisions. According to the decision, “the visibly complex nature of the unfolding of the facts and the mode of narration chosen by the criminal court [dans son jugement] were likely to lead to some confusion in the role of each”.
“While it is certain that Ladj Ly was not convicted of attempted murder, this error, limited to the sole qualification of the facts (…) and committed by a non-lawyer, cannot suffice to deprive the factual basis of its relevance”.
“Malice” and “extraordinary bad faith”
The director’s lawyer has announced her intention to appeal. During the hearing on February 4, Mr.and Julia Minkowski had criticized “seriously defamatory information” and denounced “the malevolence” as well as “extraordinary bad faith” of the item.
” talker is a journal of opinions, not investigations”had replied the magazine’s lawyer, while admitting a “qualifying error”. Mand Rodolphe Bosselut had also argued that the article had been rectified the day after its publication.
“We are obviously very satisfied with the decision rendered”he said, Wednesday.