French Justice is Deaf as well as Blind
September 3, 2024 marked a turning point in the 30-year French battle for asbestos justice. A struggle to hold to account some of the people responsible for the country’s deadly asbestos epidemic collapsed when the Court of Cassation (Supreme Court) issued a ruling upholding a 2023 dismissal by the Paris Court of Appeals of criminal charges against executives of the country’s biggest asbestos group: Eternit.1
This was the latest in a series of defeats faced by asbestos victims and their legal representatives.2 It related to proceedings initiated by several associations and 1,800 asbestos victims which accused former Eternit managers and the company of manslaughter, unintentional injury and other crimes.3 The President of the National Association of Asbestos Victims (ANDEVA) Jacques Faugeron was incensed by this week’s verdict calling it an “injustice” and expressing the views of many ANDEVA members: “It seems,” he said “that justice does not want a criminal trial.”4
Although the five defendants had, undeniably, been in positions of authority they could not, so the judges ruled, be held to account due to “the impossibility of dating the poisoning of the plaintiffs,” which made it “impossible to determine who was in charge within the company.”
 Paris demonstration by asbestos victims, October 13, 2016. |
According to government statistics, more than 3,000 people in France die every year from asbestos-related diseases.5 In 2006, the national asbestos tragedy was described by Mr Sargos, the President of the Social Chamber of the Supreme Court, as a “societal crime.”6 And yet, more than one hundred years after Labor Inspector Denis Auribault first reported excess mortality of asbestos workers in a textile factory in Condé-sur-Noireau, Calvados, French courts continue to fail the victims. Shame on them!
September 6, 2024
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1 Amiante: non-lieu définitif dans le dossier Eternit [Asbestos: definitive dismissal of the case in the Eternit case]. September 4, 2024.
https://www.lequotidiendumedecin.fr/sante-societe/democratie-sanitaire/amiante-non-lieu-definitif-dans-le-dossier-eternit
2 Kazan-Allen, L. Asbestos Contamination at Jussieu University: “A Judicial Scandal.” July 10, 2023.
http://ibasecretariat.org/lka-asbestos-contamination-at-jussieu-university-a-judicial-scandal.php
3 Kazan-Allen, L. Paris Court Spurns Victims’ Petition. May 24, 2023.
http://ibasecretariat.org/lka-paris-court-spurns-victims-petition.php
4 Amiante: vers un procès pénal ? La Cour de cassation tranche ce mardi [Asbestos: towards a criminal trial? The Court of Cassation rules this Tuesday]. September 2, 2024.
https://granville.maville.com/actu/actudet_-amiante-vers-un-proces-penal-la-cour-de-cassation-tranche-ce-mardi-_54135-6442843_actu.Htm
5 Roméo L. « Le parquet essaie d’empêcher la tenue d’un procès sur l’amiante » [“The prosecution is trying to prevent the holding of an asbestos trial”]. May 20, 2023.
https://www.lepoint.fr/sante/le-parquet-essaie-d-empecher-la-tenue-d-un-proces-sur-l-amiante-19-05-2023-2520818_40.php#11
Kazan-Allen, L. Thousands Mount Silent Protest through Paris. November 2, 2008.
http://ibasecretariat.org/lka_thous_protest_paris.php
6 Assemblée nationale française. Rapport sur les risques et les conséquences de l'amiante [French National Assembly. Report on the risks and consequences of asbestos]. February 22, 2006.
https://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/12/rap-info/i2884.asp
