“If you persist in this trafficking, I don't give much for your future”: the warning from the Alès prosecutor to an 18-year-old dealer

The trial of this young man was heard at the Alès courthouse, in the Gard. MIDI LIBRE – CHARLES LEDUC

An Alès resident was tried on Monday, December 23, for participating in drug trafficking in the Cévennes district. “I hope he will take the measure of this hearing and that the court's decision will allow him to get out of it…”, declared Me Thomasian, his lawyer.

Suspected of drug trafficking, this 18-year-old Alès native with a clean criminal record seems lost when he finds himself, on Monday, December 23, in the dock of the Alès criminal court to be tried in immediate appearance. He has just spent two days in pretrial detention at the Nîmes remand center after being arrested on the morning of Friday, December 20, in the Cévennes district, where a large-scale anti-drug operation had taken place a few days earlier.

Details of the arrest of the accused

On December 20, officers from the police station’s anti-crime squad (BAC), during a pedestrian surveillance conducted in plain clothes, observed the setting up and operation of a drug dealing point on rue du Lozère. When they intervened late in the morning, they arrested one of the four protagonists, the one who was eventually brought before the courthouse, in possession of a piece of cannabis resin, a knife and a wad of bills. In a container located nearby and that they had noticed, the police got their hands on more than 130g of drugs, cannabis and cocaine, and €445 in cash.

“It's not me. The bag isn't mine”

In front of the magistrates, this young man who said he was only a lookout in police custody immediately declared: “It's not me. The bag isn't mine. I was just sitting in the neighborhood, like that!” He ended up repeating that he was monitoring the place “for the money”, that he “owes money to a colleague”, that he does this “not often”, and collects “€100 per day”. Rough in his statements, the accused, who declares, in front of his dejected relatives sitting in the courtroom, that he himself consumes cannabis, grumbles that he has “nothing to (reproach himself)for”. Noting a daily idleness conceded, Vincent Edel, the presiding judge, then says to him: “You do nothing; it is perhaps the most sensible sentence you have said…”

The solemn warning of the Alès public prosecutor's office

The public prosecutor, Abdelkrim Grini, specifies that this individual had already been arrested “for the same reasons” three weeks earlier and that he is also being tried for that. He warns the defendant: “If you were to come out of this court free, watch where you put your feet, where you get into, sir. Watch out! If you persist in this trafficking, I don't give much for your future. I'm not sure you'll make it to 20 years old…” Because, according to the prosecution, this young adult risks ending up “against a wall, riddled with bullets”, or “carbonized in the trunk of a car”. “That's reality!”, Abdelkrim Grini asserts, before requesting 12 to 15 months in prison, part of which is suspended probation which “is essential”, in order that the accused, whom he considers to be “a real dealer at his humble level”, finds himself with a sword of Damocles hanging over his head.

Was he “spotted to act as a lookout” ?

“He is the type of young man who can be manipulated by malicious people, such as traffickers”, intervenes Me Euria Thomasian. “He is left to his own devices and has certainly been identified to act as a lookout.” The defense attorney sees her client as “a victim” who “needs more supervision than a harsh punishment”, and leans towards the social investigator who considers a community service sentence (TIG) more appropriate. “I hope he will take the measure of this hearing and that the court's decision will allow him to get out of it…”

“Co-author of drug trafficking”, according to the bench

For the magistrates of the bench, this young man is “co-author of drug trafficking”; they sentence him to one year in prison with probation suspended for two years, plus a ban on carrying a weapon for two years. “The ball is now in your court”, the president Vincent Edel tells him.

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