The hunter who had accidentally killed the bear during an illegal hunt in the Pyrenees in 2021 was sentenced to four months suspended prison on Tuesday par The Foix Criminal Courtand immediately announced to appeal the decision.
Against the fifteen other hunters who participated in the hunt in the Mont-Vallier reserve, located above the village of Seix, in Ariège, The court pronounceds penalties of fines of a few hundred euros and, for two of them, a temporary suspension of the hunting permit.
The sixteen hunters must collectively pay almost 90,000 euros to the associations defending the presence of the bear in the Pyrenees, formed civil party, under the moral and ecological damage.
“The appeal was noted instantly,” said Charles Lagier, the lawyer’s lawyer. “The legal fight must continue, because the Foix court has not taken into account the non -regular existence of the Mont Vallier hunting reserve. (…) My client simply defended himself, it was him or the bear. He spoke of the state of necessity, “he told AFP.
“” Unreasonable “sanctions
And then, regrets Me Lagier, “the damages granted to the civil parties are unreasonable concerning hunters with modest income, often retired”.
The lawyer for fourteen of hunters, Fanny Campagne, also questioned “the legality of the constitution of the reserve” where the hunting accident occurred and denounces “the absence of signaling of the hunting prohibition”.
She did not rule on a possible call.
After the pronouncement of the judgment, the hunters, who hoped for the release, left the Foix court without making a declaration.
For the Pays de l’Ours association, which participates with the French Biodiversity Office (OFB) in monitoring the bear, the deliberation is “justified”.
“All the hunters have been found guilty, it is the most important for us. The court has established shortcomings, ”reacted Sabine Matraire, the president of the association, who claims new bears, believing that the Ursine population is not yet viable.
“Awareness”
“We hope that this judgment will be followed by an awareness in the world of hunting,” she said, leaving the court.
During the trial, on March 18 and 19, the 81 -year -old hunter admitted to having opened fire on the 150 kg bundle, accompanied by two cubs, in a state of “self -defense”.
“She grabbed my left thigh, I panicked and I pulled a rifle. She fell backwards, she bypassed me and bit my right calf, I fell, she poured my leg, I rearmed my rifle and I pulled. She died five meters below, “he said.
In addition to the sentence of four months suspended prison sentence, the court also sentenced him to a fine of 750 euros, to the confiscation of his hunting rifle and the withdrawal of the hunting permit.
In 2008, another hunter had been tried to have shot down in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques four years earlier. Relaxed at first instance, he had been sentenced to compensation to compensate various nature protection associations up to 10,000 euros.
The hunting association to which it belonged had been sentenced to 53,000 euros in damages for the death of cinnamon, the last piping of Pyrenean strain.
Caramellas and cinnamon have been naturalized and are today visible At the Natural History Museum in Toulouse.
Threatened with extinction in the early 1990s, the population of brown bear then developed considerably in the Pyrenees thanks to a restoration program of the species, including cowardrs from Slovenia.
According to the OFB, which formally identified 96 bears on the basis of genetic fingerprints during the year 2024, the mountain range now has between 97 and 127 individuals.
If there are many differences in views between hunters and environmentalists, the civil parties recognized the accidental nature of the fatal shot, as well as the accusation.
But, underlined the prosecutor at the trial, the octogenarian hunter “has knowingly taken the risk of confrontation with the bear in the reserve, which is an area of tranquility” for this animal.
