Suspicions of trafficking around a grocery store in Alès: two suspects ask the Nîmes Court of Appeal for their release

Me Massal, l’avocat d’un des suspects mercredi 3 avril à l’issue de l’audience de la chambre de l’instruction. HOCINE ROUAGDIA

The police and an investigating judge from the Alès judicial court are investigating alleged drug trafficking around a grocery store. Two suspects requested their release on Wednesday April 3. One of them remains in prison, the other will be determined on his fate on April 8.

The affair started in December 2022 when police officers from the Alès police station carried out a check on a business in Saint-Martin-de-Valgégales . A dog specializing in the search for narcotics accompanies the officials.
On the floor of the building the animal becomes agitated and points to an apartment in which investigators get their hands on 9,000 euros; cash, 10 kg of cannabis resin and around a hundred grams of heroin, as well as cocaine.

A judicial investigation is opened in July 2023 with the referral to an investigating judge from Alès. The police have since stepped up investigations; in December 2023, a large-scale search was organized.

Two suspects involved in this case and imprisoned since December 2023 requested their release from the investigating chamber of the Nîmes Court of Appeal. A brief reminder of the procedures detailed that the drug detection dog marked several places in the convenience store where several thousand euros were found as well as packets of cigarettes.

For one of the suspects, Mr Olivier Massal, the lawyer of a detainee explained that his client had been the subject of economic dismissal but had always worked and had obtained a promise of employment to support his request for release as well as accommodation with a relative but outside the region where the alleged acts occurred.

An investigating judge in Alès had ordered the indictment of the forty-year-old for drug offenses and criminal conspiracy.

The attorney general, Dominique Sié, opposed the release. The deliberations will be made on 8 April.

Automatic pistol, ammo and shit pads

The other suspect whose investigation showed that he was linked to the first, also asked on Wednesday April 3 to be released from detention (he was incarcerated in November 2023) in the investigating chamber where it was recalled that he was indicted for drug trafficking, criminal conspiracy and possession of weapons.< /p>

During the searches, cartridges and an automatic pistol were discovered as well as 25 strips of cannabis. Me Sophie Bonnaud, the suspect’s lawyer, presented all the guarantees to benefit from placement under judicial supervision.

The attorney general requested and obtained continued detention, recently ordered by the judge of freedoms and detention of the Alès judicial court. This Thursday, April 4, the Nîmes Court of Appeal therefore ordered the continued detention of this Alésien.

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