Wild deposits in the Calanques National Park. (Drawing). – Calanques National Park
- Several company headquarters and two construction sites were searched Tuesday after months of investigating wild dumping of site spoil on the French Riviera.
- It is a “system that has been organized for several years”.
- Multiple offenses are suspected, with sentences of up to 10 years in prison.
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The headquarters of six public works companies and two construction sites were taken over on Tuesday by investigators who placed 11 people in police custody after months of investigating
wild dumping of excavated material on the
French Riviera. “In recent months, complaints and reports about wild” outbursts “of site embankments (…) have been underway with the prosecutors of Draguignan and Nice,” recalled in a statement the prosecution of Draguignan.
The investigation revealed “a system organized for several years”, he said: “Hundreds of thousands of cubic meters of earth, concrete, scrap metal, tar had been dumped in about twenty irretrievably disfigured sites, between Fréjus, Le Luc and Trans-en-Provence, in the Var, and as far as Sospel in the Alpes-Maritimes ”.
Deception or threat of owners
The companies obtained contracts for the evacuation of rubble, billed at the regulatory tariff but disposed of and stored the spoil “on private or public land, by deceiving or threatening the owners”, all of which cost “about five times cheaper”, still describes the parquet.
Tuesday’s raid mobilized nearly 200 constables, supported by a helicopter and assisted by agents from the tax administration and the regional environment department.
Several trucks and construction equipment were seized in connection with the multiple suspected offenses: irregular management of waste in organized gangs, abandonment of waste in organized gangs, swindling in organized gangs, laundering of swindles in organized gangs, threat of death, crime or offense against a public officer, extortion by violence, money laundering, work concealed by concealment of activity and by concealment of employees. The penalties may go up to 10 years in prison and a million euros fine, in addition to damages and costs of restoring contaminated land.
Waste treatment, particularly from construction sites, is problematic in the Southeast. In August 2019, the mayor of the Var village of Signes Jean-Mathieu Michel, 76, died accidentally run over by a van whose occupants he wanted to verbalize, who had nothing to do with the rubble. to see with the file evoked Tuesday by the prosecutor of Draguignan.
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