Leaflets, posters, meetings, complaints… and now soap opera videos on youtube.com spice up Marly’s election campaign. The mayor’s former chief of staff is rattling his cage.
Charming little town of 10,000 inhabitants watered by the river Seille, Marly sleeps less than six kilometres from Metz. The quietness of this suburban town is only apparent. Because the three lists that compete in the municipal elections do not give each other any gifts. This is evidenced by the “reports” to the public prosecutor and the regional chamber of accounts, police investigations and videos that can be seen on youtube.com where it is a question of embezzlement, favouritism, sale of real estate to an elected representative … In short, Dallas sur Seille, oil and luxury ranch less.
A real estate agency
he current mayor, Thierry Hory (LR) is running for a second term with the Ensemble pour Marly list. This 57-year-old bank branch manager is also vice-president of Metz-Métropole, regional councillor for the Grand Est region and president of the Société d’Équipement du Bassin Lorraine (SEBL) Grand Est. That keeps him busy.
Opposite, Frédéric Rose (Marly with you, various left) and Christian Nowicki (Unite and act for Marly, various right) are not willing to leave the outgoing mayor in charge of the commune any longer. Because of a few cases that they denounce publicly.
One of them concerns the sale of premises belonging to the commune, the former club house of the Marly football club.
In March 2015, an Immo Service Plus company wants to buy this premises to install a nursery. The town council gives its approval for the sale at the price of the domains, 175,000 €. But, one year later, the buyer changed his mind. He no longer buys. The price is revised downwards: 160.000 €. Two months later, on 26 May 2016, the price of the same property is revised downwards again: 130,000 € (excluding notary fees and taxes). The property is put up for sale. On 27 June 2016, a property trader buys but does not make the payment until 7 months later. In the meantime, the finance assistant, Nathalie Casciola, has created with her husband a SCI which buys back the property. To set up a real estate agency in the city centre.
Reporting to JIRS
This potential conflict of interest did not escape the notice of opposition municipal councillor Christian Nowicki, who wanted to inform his fellow citizens via the municipal newspaper. “Three municipal police officers came to my home to dissuade me,” he said. “The article was censored.
The case did not end there. On 21 January 2020, the Anticor association reported the case to the Nancy JIRS, an inter-regional jurisdiction made up of public prosecutors and investigators with good experience of organised crime and financial delinquency in complex cases. The investigation is ongoing.
Another case has been reported to the public prosecutor in Metz. It dates from August 2019. This time, six municipal councillors from the opposition groups “Une nouvelle Energie pour Marly” chaired by Angèle Gaurois Bachel and “Agir pour Marly” chaired by Christian Nowicki have seized the prosecutor for a dark story of training of elected officials which, according to them, could amount to misappropriation of public funds.
Pre-election communication
The case dates back to 21 November 2018 when the mayor decided to entrust the company ONCAP (whose head is also elected in Lunéville) with the organisation of a “seminar on communication in the pre-election period”. A whole program that still costs 5,900 € to the taxpayers of Marly. The problem is that out of the twenty or so participants, some of the elected officials registered were not present although they signed the sign-up sheet, the others are militants or sympathizers of the mayor’s list. Hence the concern. For these elements are likely to “constitute the offence of embezzlement of public funds by a person holding public authority”, write the elected officials to the prosecutor. The mayor filed a complaint for slanderous denunciation, including against Angèle Gaurois.
A preliminary investigation has been launched by Nancy’s SRPJ, which has already held hearings. Geolocation via the WhatsApp app on smartphones seems to confirm the doubts of opposition politicians.
The dir-cab balances
That’s not all. Arnaud Derom, who was director of cabinet (dir-cab) of mayor Thierry Hory from September 1, 2018 to June 17, 2019, when he resigned, is making a serious statement on You Tube. This PhD student in public law from Nice “noted many democratic and financial deviances” he explains. With the groups “Une Nouvelle Energie pour Marly” and “Agir pour Marly” he sent a report to the proc and the Regional Chamber of Accounts on several “cases”. It must be said that Angèle Gaurois (Une nouvelle énergie pour Marly), who has been in the opposition, is his companion.
From now on, Arnaud Derom settles his accounts with the mayor of Marly in the form of a soap opera via youtube.com. Two episodes for the moment. Others could follow. “If I’m sued,” he says, “I’ll plead the exception of truth. Because I have all the evidence I need to prove my case. ”
The mayor also responds with a video in the form of a fable. Another trial in prospect.
The moral of the story? Elected honestly, you’ll stay, otherwise you’ll be in big trouble.
To be continued…
Thierry Hory : “There is no subject”
We asked Thierry Hory to explain the charges against him. First by e-mail, which was not answered. Then by telephone. Mr. Hory took us down: “No, I don’t answer, you come after the war. ” Then he changed his mind: “On the first question, there’s no subject. On the second, there’s an investigation by the district attorney. If you were an investigative journalist, you’d be interested in the former chief of staff,” he adds, “If you were an investigative journalist, you’d be interested in the former chief of staff. “I’m not an investigative journalist, I’m a journalist. I’m a journalist. Period.
As for Arnaud Derom, to my knowledge, he’s not running for mayor in Marly.
End of conversation.
Mr. Rose’s clarification: “A clean campaign”…
“Mr. Marcel Gay, you have plurals that seem quite singular to me! I have never denounced the slightest affair during this campaign and have always endeavoured to stay above the gutter during all my interventions, my visits to the inhabitants, my writings. During the last few months I have deplored the noxious and detestable climate which hangs over the city and which distresses me as much as it distresses the citizens. I have said on many occasions that I advocate reconciliation, and you may not be an investigative journalist, but a journalist, so I invite you to verify these statements and above all to make a correction as soon as possible. My campaign is clean, loyal (I respect my two competitors and, if we have differences of opinion, we don’t have any personal ones), and has no other objective than to defend my convictions, our ideas, our programme, our project. To finish as a pacifist, let me quote our great Victor Hugo: “War is the confrontation of people. Peace is the confrontation of ideas. »