It is almost 5 p.m. when Rodolphe Juy-Birmann, public prosecutor of Evry, turns to the civil parties, to warn them: “The sentence imposed (…) will seem derisory to you in view of your suffering”he explains to the victims and relatives of the seven dead, nine seriously injured and hundreds injured as a result of the derailment, on July 12, 2013, of the Intercités train number 3657, at Brétigny-sur-Orge station (Essonne).
“No pain will bring anyone back to life,” he regrets, before demanding the legal maximum against the SNCF – legal manager of the SNCF Infra subsidiary, then in charge of track maintenance – of which he has just methodically overwhelmed the “disorganization” having led to a “failure in the maintenance chain”, but also the attitude of “contempt for justice” : 450,000 euros fine. A sentence that requires the court to recognize that the railway company was in a state of legal recidivism.
” How did we get here ? », asked the prosecutor several times, while he unfolded, for four hours, the multiple “deficiencies” of the company which, by “obvious negligence”, did not detect in time the crack in the “heart”, the device which allows the crossing of rails. A heart that has “never been examined”, he believes, sweeping the defense of the company – for which the disaster is due to an undetectable defect in the steel composing the splint which gave way on July 12. The usury, he argues on the basis of the expert reports, “did not happen in a day, we can clearly see the slow degradation of the assembly”. For him, “the only explanation lies in the failures in carrying out maintenance”, partly due to the organization of the SNCF into various subsidiaries in search of cost reduction, even if it means neglecting inspections and maintenance.
“Failure of the hierarchical chain”
Methodically reviewing the reports of the various inspections and their shortcomings, Rodolphe Juy-Birmann castigates the “failure of the hierarchical chain totally anesthetized” of the company, which “does not question”. He also mentions the “slow degradation” the working conditions of railway workers, whose profession is “impacted by the profitability objectives imposed on them”, pushing them not to dismantle the device to inspect it, as the protocol nevertheless provides, in order to “make the way for traffic faster”. More than a lack of personnel, the prosecutor points to a “mismatch between human needs and maintenance needs”, leading them to poorly conduct equipment inspections. “We are slipping because other emergencies take precedence”he justifies.
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