a car dealership manager sentenced for malus tax fraud
The man falsified the registrations of his most polluting new vehicles, exempting them from the malus tax imposed on the purchase.
A man with the head of four car dealerships was sentenced on Tuesday January 10, 2023 by the criminal court of Marseilles (Bouches-du-Rhône) to twelve months of suspended imprisonment, 25,000 euros fine and two years of deprivation of the right of eligibility for acts “fraud committed against a public person“, indicated the parquet floor of Marseille to the Figaro.
The manager of these concessions, the only natural person summoned to the hearing, appeared for having carried out “fraudulent maneuversallowing him to avoid paying the malus tax on the vehicles he offered for purchase. The respondent falsified the registration certificates of his most polluting cars during the sale. The cars sold were placed under “a special tax exemption scheme“.
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Confiscations of up to 3.1 million euros
As a reminder, the malus tax is a system put in place following the Grenelle de l’environnement organized in France in 2007. It takes the form of an additional tax paid when vehicles deemed polluting are first registered, c ie according to their CO2 emissions, their fiscal power and their weight. Cars acquired by a person with a mobility inclusion card and hybrid, electric or hydrogen engines are exempt.
The suspect, identified by investigators from the Bouches-du-Rhône departmental road safety squadron, had previously been placed in police custody. According to the Marseille public prosecutor’s office, this type of trickery is well known to the authorities, with fraudsters seeking to pay this tax to reduce the cost of registration and therefore the final sale price to their buyers.
In addition to the penalties received as a natural person, the manager will also have to pay several fines for a cumulative total of 800,000 euros, being the moral representative of the four concessions. Justice also imposed the confiscation of several of its vehicles, for an amount of 3.1 million euros.