Billionaire Bernard Arnault tells courtroom he was ‘utterly unaware’ ex-spy chief had allegedly abused powers to guard LVMH

Bernard Squarcini, the previous head of the DCRI safety service (since renamed the DGSI), is one in every of 10 males on trial and charged with utilizing his safety contacts for personal acquire, together with acquiring confidential data on behalf of LVMH.

Squarcini faces 11 costs within the Paris prison courtroom case, together with affect peddling, misuse of public funds and compromising nationwide safety data.

“I want to level out that I’m right here as a witness, a easy witness, and that my indictment was by no means thought-about by the investigating magistrates,” Arnault mentioned in his opening assertion.

“I used to be utterly unaware” of the alleged scheme, he added.

The fees relate each to the interval when Squarcini headed the DCRI from 2008-12 and to his subsequent return to the non-public sector, when he labored largely for LVMH as a advisor.

Investigators say that as early as 2008, DCRI officers have been deployed to attempt to establish a blackmailer focusing on Arnault.

Different allegations relate to spying on Francois Ruffin, a former journalist who’s now a number one left-wing lawmaker — and, from 2013 to 2016, the leftist newspaper Fakir that Ruffin based.

Earlier than his 2017 election to parliament, Ruffin produced a satirical movie about Arnault titled “Merci Patron” (“Thanks Boss”) that received a Cesar award — French cinema’s equal of an Oscar.

Ruffin, whose legal professionals requested that Arnault testify, has mentioned that the lawsuit had “been decapitated” as a result of LVMH itself was not within the dock.

The corporate settled out of courtroom in 2021, paying 10 million euros in fines. Arnault was interrogated by investigating magistrates however neither he nor LVMH have been ever placed on trial.

LVMH had been involved concerning the actions of Ruffin, who on the time was planning to disrupt its shareholder conferences.

‘Completely not’

However Arnault mentioned that within the accord with investigating magistrates “it’s said that the group doesn’t recognise any duty”, saying the deal had been “proposed” by the magistrates.

Agreeing to the deal was a query of “avoiding being caught up within the media uproar that adopted”, Arnault informed the courtroom.

He additionally denounced Ruffin, saying “I feel he’s attempting to take advantage of this trial for private, media, political and even industrial causes”.

Requested by the decide if he was conscious of an tried blackmail focusing on his non-public life in 2008, for which the DCRI mobilised its brokers to establish the blackmailer, Arnault replied: “Completely not.”

Arnault was additionally questioned if he was knowledgeable by Pierre Gode, the vice chairman of the group who died in 2018, of surveillance of Francois Ruffin and Fakir. He replied in an identical trend: “Completely not.”

Arnault, who recurrently vies with the likes of Elon Musk for the title of the world’s richest particular person, has alongside together with his household a fortune of $158.6 billion, based on Forbes journal.

He additionally rejected the allegations regarding LVMH’s work practices in Ruffin’s documentary, describing his group as one which pays “8 billion” euros to the state per yr in taxes and “recruits essentially the most in France”.

LVMH has sought to additional broaden its empire particularly into media, final month taking management of the shiny weekly Paris Match to affix the dailies Les Echos and Le Parisien in its media steady.

In one other eye-catching transfer, the Arnault household is about to purchase a controlling stake in soccer membership Paris FC in a transfer that might make the Ligue 2 outfit a rival to French giants Paris Saint-Germain.