The sentencing judge revoked, on Friday March 8, the suspended sentence enjoyed by Marco Mouly, one of the figures in the giant VAT scam on the carbon market, who could therefore soon be incarcerated.
In a decision revealed by Mediapart and of which Agence France-Presse (AFP) was aware, the judge considered that several obligations imposed on this protagonist of the “scam of the century” at the time of one of his convictions, pronounced in 2019, had not been respected.
After the court’s decision to detain Marco Mouly, the latter announced to Mediapart that he had gone on the run to “challenge the police”. “I blame society. I stand by and here comes a case from 1998! What do you want me to do? “, he told the investigative media.
Concerning that of working, the person concerned held “a fictitious job” as a community manager, according to the judge, and “he provided the justice system with false pay slips, against the backdrop of a well-oiled organization”. At the same time, he declared during an audition that he was working on a second book and had landed a leading role in a film which should be shot soon.
Appeal of the decision
Marco Mouly, known as “Marco the Elegant”, also did not pay the fine in full, the judge noting a balance of 11,569 euros of a fine of 15,000 euros. He also owes very large sums in connection with his other convictions, all cases combined, it is noted in the decision.
Consequently, the judge orders the partial revocation for eighteen months of the three-year prison sentence pronounced in April 2019 by the Paris Court of Appeal for fraud carried out by an organized gang during 1998 and 1999. This sentence of three years in prison was suspended on probation for a period of three years. The probation expiration date was set for January 20, 2024.
His lawyer, Me Philippe Ohayon, announced to AFP that he had appealed this decision, “unfair, illegal and unjust” according to him. “Could the prosecution have the elegance to let the court of appeal have the last word in this matter rather than creating a climate of terror for the payment of a fine? “, did he declare.
At the end of June 2017, Marco Mouly, as well as Arnaud Mimran, had already been sentenced on appeal to eight years’ imprisonment and a fine of one million euros in the so-called “carbon tax” affair, a vast carbon fraud. VAT on the market for pollution rights. With the other main defendants in the case, they were ordered to pay 283 million euros in damages to the State. Marco Mouly, born in May 1965, was placed on semi-release in April 2020.
