The former mayor of Ambleteuse (Pas-de-Calais), Arnaud Lelièvre du Breuille, was sentenced on Wednesday March 23, 2022 to two months in prison suspended by the court of Boulogne-sur-Mer. In 2018, he had land plowed where he knew there was a very rare and protected species of orchid: the Jester Orchis. The city councilor had decided to build a synthetic football pitch there. “Justice recognizes that this mayor behaved like a vandal! », Appreciates Vincent Colas president of the Armeria association, civil party to the trial.
Arnaud Lelièvre du Breuille, not re-elected in 2021, knew the exceptional nature of this plot and had requested an exemption before the regional higher scientific council for natural heritage, which had refused him.
In addition to the two months in prison, the former elected official is condemned to repair but the defenders of the environment are skeptical: “The damage is done deplores Vincent Colas. Our fight is to obtain from state services a protection status for this plot. We do not know if the orchids will be able to grow back, they live in symbiosis with fungi, but the plowing has broken this symbiosis. But since we have no equivalent in terms of destruction, we have no perspective. We will see if, by protecting it, this emblematic and extremely rare parcel can come back to life. »
Considering this attitude unworthy of an elected official, the defenders of the environment, Armeria in the lead, intend to ask for the resignation of the one who is still a municipal councilor of Ambleteuse.
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