The trial of the Balkany spouses, tried on appeal in Paris for laundering aggravated tax fraud, becomes surreal. And expeditious.
Delayed by a day because of the lawyers’ strike, it did not start until Tuesday afternoon and continued for two hours of hearing this Wednesday. And already, the debates are coming to an end.
They will not resume until Tuesday afternoon next for the personality examination of Isabelle Balkany, then the pleadings of the civil party and the requisitions of the public prosecutor’s office. The defense will plead Wednesday and it will be over. Initially, the trial was to be held until February 19, four half days a week.
It must be said that the two defendants are absent. Patrick Balkany, too ill to appear, remains in the cell of the prison of Health. Isabelle Balkany only made an appearance Tuesday afternoon because she favors her visits to the visiting room with her husband rather than the audience. In any event, she decided not to answer any question from the court on the alleged facts.
The requisitions expected next Tuesday
The alleged facts did not occupy the court for a few hours, between the end of the day on Tuesday and the short morning of Wednesday. It is still the hidden heritage of the Levallois-Perret couple.
Estimated at least 13 million euros, it is hidden in a tangle of offshore companies including its villa in Saint-Martin, in the West Indies, and a palace in Marrakech, Morocco, whose spouses Balkany dispute ownership.
