How Monaco got rid of a magistrate deemed too curious
The SMS is dated August 3, 2019; it is signed by Brigitte Gambarini, head of the Monaco Court of Appeal since 2012: “My one-hour interview with the sovereign was as painful as it was dense (…) His words were very unfair to me, but he almost pained me, and I found him very lonely. » This message is one of hundreds of exchanges that the former Monegasque investigating judge Edouard Levrault unearthed from the WhatsApp messaging system installed on his partner’s phone, a channel he used to discuss in complete confidentiality with Mme Gambarini between August – date of his eviction from the Rock, where the magistrate had been in office for three years – and January 2021.
Redacted of their private content then authenticated by a bailiff’s report on May 7, 2021, these conversations, of which The world was able to become acquainted, to shed a harsh light on the local judicial mores. Their revelation could cause new turmoil in the Principality, already shaken by a story to which The world has just dispensed a two-part investigation: the so-called Dossiers du Rocher affair, a website where an anonymous source has been making serious accusations, for several months, against the Prince’s entourage.
Edouard Levrault is an investigating judge of the reckless kind as the Principality fears. “Exfiltrated” against his will to the Nice court in 2019 (he currently chairs a correctional chamber there), after three years of secondment to Monaco, this 45-year-old magistrate has shaken the Rock. And it may not be over. In charge between 2016 and 2019 of several sensitive files, he notably charged the owner of the local football club, AS Monaco, Dmitri Rybolovlev, in the Bouvier case, named after an art dealer with whom the the Russian oligarch is conflicted. On the sidelines of this case, the judge indicted several other figures in the Principality (a minister, several police officials, etc.) suspected of having worked in favor of Rybolovlev. He went so far as to demand the hearing of Prince Albert in person.
Seizure of the ECHR
Among the personalities prosecuted, Christophe Haget, head of the Monegasque judicial police, then defended by Eric Dupond-Moretti when he was still a lawyer. Everything except one detail. Because barely appointed Minister of Justice by Emmanuel Macron, in July 2020, the ex-lawyer hastened to seize the general inspection of justice (IGJ) in order to initiate disciplinary proceedings against Edouard Levrault, on the grounds that the magistrate would have “failed in its duties of reserve and prudence” by agreeing to give himself up on June 10, 2020 to the television program “Pieces à conviction”, broadcast on France 3. Suspected of having taken advantage of his arrival at the chancellery to settle his accounts with Mr. Levrault, the Keeper of the Seals has been prosecuted by the Court of Justice of the Republic, since July 16, 2021, for “illegal taking of interests”.
The aftershocks of the Levrault affair are also felt on the Rock. Ousted from his post on the spot in the summer of 2019, the magistrate, convinced of having paid for his “activism” in the Bouvier file, has since multiplied the counter-attacks. After filing a complaint in the Principality, in April 2020, against the former Minister of State Serge Telle for “slanderous denunciation”, he filed a complaint on the same count in Paris, against X this time, on January 13, after having discovered the underside of his non-renewal in Monaco. Thus, this recall would have been decided after the French Ministry of Justice received, in June 2019, from the Monegasque authorities, a “white note” (document without header or signature) questioning the skills of the magistrate.
The world was able to consult this two-page note, of which Mr. Levrault wishes to identify the signatories and sponsors. The magistrate is accused there of having, by his “Behaviour perceived as authoritarian and vexatious”put “endangering the proper functioning of the criminal justice system”or to have ” increase incidents with judicial police officers “. A preliminary investigation was opened into these facts by the Paris prosecutor’s office in February. Determined to have it recognized that his eviction was unlawful, the judge also seized the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) which, according to our information, has just ruled his application against the Principality admissible. On February 18, the ECHR even ordered the Monegasque and French governments to send it their observations.
“Message of support and serenity”
The magistrate above all took a spectacular initiative: recording his exchanges by SMS with the president of the Principality’s Court of Appeal (Brigitte Gambarini), after having learned of the content of the disciplinary proceedings opened in Paris against him. Mr. Levrault was indeed startled when he discovered the testimony of Ms.me Gambarini, must not be close. On March 24, 2021, before the IGJ, the first president of the Monaco Court of Appeal said the following, in particular, about her colleague’s participation in “Exhibits”, and her criticisms of local justice: “My arms dropped when I saw this show. I was surprised because it did not correspond to the vision I had of this magistrate; then I was saddened because it harmed the Principality’s image and irritated because we did everything to help him in his work. » “I had experienced a disappointment similar to Charles Duchaine”an M addedme Gambarini, in reference to the current boss of the French Anti-Corruption Agency, in post between 1995 and 1999 in Monaco. “The image sent back from Monaco is near: smearing the whole institution when we were colleagues, even friends when it comes to Charles Duchaine. It’s not very fair. »
The text messages unearthed by Mr. Levrault, however, suggest that Brigitte Gambarini did not always have the same opinion of her “colleague” Edouard Levrault
The text messages unearthed by Mr. Levrault, however, suggest that Brigitte Gambarini did not always have the same opinion of her “colleague” Edouard Levrault. Thus, on June 11, 2020, the day after the broadcast of the famous program, she wrote this to the company of the magistrate: “A message of support and serenity after this report imbued with sobriety, clarity and self-control. I feared too much risk-taking for E, but the objectivity remains, and it’s a real slowdown to hear certain things; no ethical limit[logique] did not seem to me to have been crossed, and certain constant facts deserved publicity hitherto prohibited. » In a translated text message to the judge himself, she adds: “I had really feared for you yesterday, but your prudence and your skill would get the better of their desire for revenge. »
Contrary to his attitude towards the general inspection of justice, Mme Gambarini, herself a Monegasque, therefore never ceased, during her exchanges with the Levrault couple, to claim her support and to fire red balls at the Principality. At the beginning of August 2019, she wrote as follows: “My compatriots didn’t understand anything; to defend one’s personal interests, one leaves the honor of a state. I wash and will wash away the false images conveyed on Edouard. I will explain (…) how he worked and what was his sense of public service, for a country that did not deserve it. »
In fact, at this time, the president of the court of appeal supports her colleague, even in the office of prince Albert, who would have encouraged her to resign for this reason. On August 7, 2019, she told the Levrault couple: “It went extremely badly. The interview was particularly painful, because it tended to get me to leave voluntarily. I refused, saying that it would not be a service to my country or to my interlocutor, because it did not exist in any State of law. And that it would be necessary to go to the disciplinary against me. I asked if my fault consisted in having correctly evaluated a magistrate who had been very well noted for fifteen years (…) I lived the most unpleasant hour of my life. » Requested by The worldMme Gambarini did not respond.
“Terrible atmosphere”
At the end of August 2019, Mme Gambarini writes again: “They wanted to make me proposals and force me to justify their decision with a shameful departure (…) I will not stay in an institution where judges are so despised. » A little later, she adds for the judge’s company: “France must above all insist on the fact that Edouard is the fourth remarkable magistrate to be treated in this way”before entrusting: “Let him, like all of us, be particularly careful (…) Tell him out loud, I’m being spied on step by step in the courthouse. »
At the start of the school year in September, she even confides that she has “the ball in the stomach at the idea of returning soon in the middle of all these sharks”. In mid-September 2019, it goes further: “It’s a whole system that is in question (…) I cannot condone threats or pressure or attempts to buy off a judge. » A few days later, she wrote again: “It is difficult to forget the threats and attempted purchases to which I have been subjected”evoking “networks and brothers…” On September 22, 2019, she finally noted: “The atmosphere here is appalling. » And the magistrate concludes: “I no longer have my place in this institution, I feel like a puppet in a comedy of dupes. » Two and a half years later, Brigitte Gambarini is still the first president of the Monaco Court of Appeal.