French biathlete Julia Simon is the subject of two complaints for credit card fraud, including one filed by another biathlete from the France team, a judicial source told AFP on Wednesday, confirming information from L’Equipe. “Two complaints have indeed been filed for credit card fraud” in Savoie, by a biathlete from the France team and by a person from the staff, the first in December, the second in May, indicated this judicial source.
Damages over 1000 euros
The presumed damages amount respectively to 1,600 euros and to around twenty euros, she specified. According to L’Equipe, one of the two complainants is the reigning Olympic champion in mass start Justine Braisaz-Bouchet, and the alleged facts date from the summer of 2022, during a pre-season internship in Norway. “Fabien Saguez, president of the French Ski Federation (FFS), was brought to seize the National Disciplinary Commission in the spring for internal facts at the French biathlon team”, indicated the FFS in a press release on Wednesday. .
“At the end of the hearing” which was held on June 1, “this independent commission considered that only the results of the criminal investigation will make it possible to determine whether the facts alleged against Julia Simon are proven. It therefore pronounced a stay of proceedings pending the decision of the competent criminal body in charge of this case”, she continued. “This is the very beginning of the investigation” and Simon should be “heard soon by the gendarmerie services”, probably during the summer, said the judicial source. “Julia Simon’s position is clear: to challenge the version of the facts which is made, and to hope that the investigation will be able to make it possible to move forward”, declared to AFP his lawyer Me Jean-Michel Raynaud.
Julia Simon (26) won the Biathlon World Cup last winter, making her the world No.1, and she was also crowned pursuit world champion in February. Braisaz-Bouchet (27) is due to return to competition next winter after giving birth to her first child in early 2023.