They had deceived horse butchers and consumers by selling them meat unfit for human consumption, in particular from laboratory horses from the Sanofi farm: twenty-four defendants were sentenced on Tuesday February 28 in Marseille, for a vast fraud committed there are ten years.
Patrick Rochette, meat wholesaler in Narbonne (Aude), to whom the Marseille criminal court awarded “main responsibility”, is the most heavily sentenced, with three years in prison including two years suspended, a fine of 15,000 euros and a five-year ban on carrying out any activity related to the equine industry. The year of firm imprisonment will be served at home under an electronic bracelet, said Céline Ballerini, the president of the court.
During the three weeks of the trial, in January, Patrick Rochette, 68, had admitted the slaughter of horses from the Sanofi laboratory farm whose passport nevertheless bore the mention “definitely removed from human consumption”. The horse dealer admitted that he replaced the initial drug treatment sheet with a blank document.
“The fraud is obvious and could jeopardize health security on national territory and abroad”denounced Mme Ballerini, evoking in particular these horses which had enabled Sanofi to develop antivenom serums. However, an expert report ruled out any toxicological risk for consumers.
Sentenced to two years in prison, including six months to be served under an electronic bracelet, a five-year ban on exercising in the equine sector and a fine of 20,000 euros, Fabrice Daniel, farmer and horse trader in the Gard, supplied Sanofi with these laboratory horses, then took them back, once they had been reformed after several years, by buying them back for ten euros per animal. These animals were then sold to Patrick Rochette.
“Disregard of health rules”
The court pointed to its “windfall profits” and his “disregard of health rules”. In its judgment, however, the court specified that it took into account the age of the facts as well as a “a certain wait-and-see attitude from the administration and the absence of clear instructions” in the application of European legislation in force since 2009.
With the exception of a Spanish horse dealer, who was absent during the hearings and sentenced to two years in prison, including one year, all the sentences handed down against the twenty-one other defendants are all suspended and range from two to thirty months. The heaviest penalize the touts of horses for Patrick Rochette or those who exported animals to Italy, Poland and Spain with false documents.
Beyond the Sanofi horses, the defendants had animals slaughtered which should not be slaughtered for regulatory reasons. The hearing thus established the use of dead horse passports to provide papers to animals that do not have any, or the use of a fake stamp from a Chambéry veterinarian.
Evoking the “complacency of health professionals”, the court sentenced the eight veterinarians who were on trial to suspended prison terms ranging from two to six months. The prosecutor Jean-Yves Lourgouilloux had however requested the release of four of them, considering that nothing established “that we switch from professional shortcomings to fraudulent intent”. One euro for non-pecuniary damage was allocated to Sanofi, the amount that the laboratory claimed.