He hit his ex-wife in front of their child because she apparently provoked him
On January 26, S.E. walks towards her former home in Colombier where still lives L.L, her husband, whom she is separated from since four months. She is coming to retrieve a document needed to enroll their child in school. On the road, she precisely meets L.L, who arrives by car.
To the gendarmes, to whom she filed her complaint a few hours later, she said that the 29-year-old man asked her to get into the car, and she refused. But at the time where she was going away, he got out of his vehicle and pushed her. Then once she fell, he hit her head several times on the ground. Bruises to the face and knee are noticed by a doctor who also diagnosed a generalized anxiety and pronounce an ITT (Total Inability to Work) for five days.
Heard the next day by the gendarmes, the ex-husband presents a different version of the facts that he confirmed at the Criminal Court of Saint-Martin where he is summoned on Thursday, May 4th. “My ex-wife called me for an insurance document. I was in the Terres-Basses and was blocked on the Sandy ground bridge. I went as agreed at the bus station and I looked for her but she was no longer there. I called her and she told me she went back to Colombier to get the invoice. I saw her 100 meters from my place and gave her the document, but she asked me for another document which I only had the original. I told her that I'll send her a copy later. She got mad, took my cell phone and threatened to break it, while I'd just bought it. She threw it on the ground and this caused the facts for which I am being tried today.”
Listening this statement, S.E, assisted by a translator, is not filing a civil complaint and retorts: “I don't have a phone, and I did not throw his phone either”. She slightly modifies her version: “I was walking towards the house, I was going to a friend's house, I bumped into him on the way.” He then asks rhetorically: “if she has no phone, how did I found out she wanted a document?” and adds having three witnesses who were with him in the car.
“I got out of the car and I pushed, it's true, she fell, it's true, and I hit her head three times. I lost it, the cries of the little one (their son, editor’s note) stopped me. I did it because she provoked me. It is the first time that I am tried in a court. I am neither aggressive nor violent” tries to justify the accused who is not represented by a lawyer.
In his indictment, the Deputy Prosecutor Yves Paillard lingers on the facts rather than the unclear circumstances - in this case: “You are saying you are not violent, maybe. But that day you were. Whether you have been provoked or not, it does not matter. It is not wise to do that in front of your son.” He recalled that lesser offenses become tortious as soon as they are committed on a person with whom you have emotional or maintained a common life and requests a fine of 800 euros with half suspended prison sentence.
Gérard Egron-Reverseau, the President of the Court, estimated that the so-called provocation does not justify the behavior of L.L. and sentenced him to suspended one-month prison sentence. “It's not innocuous. Your nervousness, it must be expressed differently. Your child is very young. You're going to have to find another way to communicate with his mother.”
