French tycoon and former Adidas owner Bernard Tapie and his wife were attacked by four immigrants in a violent burglary at their home in Combs-la-Ville (Seine-et-Marne) near Paris. According to a police source, of the four suspects, three were of an “African type” and one of a “North African type”.
Combs-la-Ville
The four attackers reportedly gained access to the couple’s estate before entering through the window of one of the bedrooms on the first floor. An item belonging to them was found there. They allegedly knew the lay-out of the home.
The couple were tied up with electrical cords, physically assaulted and robbed. Bernard Tapie, 78, who was briefly a government minister, has always been a vocal advocate for immigration. And Tapie tried to reason with his torturers to make them aware of this fact. But when Tapie told the attackers that he had always stood up for migrants, one of the torturers replied: “Fuck you, that time is over!”
Tapie and his wife, Dominique, 70, had been sleeping when the assailants confronted them. “They were woken up by flashlights in the face,” a person close to the case told le Parisien. The couple were dragged from their bed, assaulted and tied up. “The attackers wanted to know where the safe was. They attacked Dominique, hitting her in the face,” this source explained. Bernard Tapie, for his part, received a violent blow with a baton behind the head, which left him stunned and confused.
The investigation has now been taken over by prosecutors in the capital Paris. Investigators from the Versailles judicial police initially had to reconstruct the attack without CCTV images: there were no cameras around the residence. But according to information from the Parisian daily, a glove was found on the scene.
According to a police source, the four immigrant suspects were all dressed in black and hooded. During the burglary and the forcible confinement, Bernard Tapie was reportedly hit in the back of the head while his wife was allegedly beaten repeatedly in the face before being dragged around the house by her hair. An ambulance transported Dominique Tapie to hospital but not her husband.
The guardian of the property and her husband were also present on the ground floor of the home at the time of the facts but did not intervene believing that they were hearing a simple discussion between the couple.
Tapie has been at the centre of legal battles concerning corruption and fraud for decades, and has spent time in jail.
The Tapie couple returned to their home on Sunday evening, very tired. An investigation for “organized robbery”, “kidnapping” and “criminal association” was opened by the Versailles prosecutor’s office, BFMTV reported.
Jean Messiha, an Egyptian-born French economist and former senior civil servant at the Ministry of Defence, who is close to the National Rally, and heads the newly-founded right-wing Apollo Institute think tank, tweeted that the “same Bernard Tapie who accused Jean-Marie Le Pen of lies about the link between insecurity and migratory invasion, has caught up with reality today”.
SOURCE
PS:The suspects ultimately made off with two watches, one of them a Rolex, as well as earrings, bracelets and a ring, a source close to the investigation told AFP.
Bernard Tapie is a former Socialist minister who came from humble beginnings but ultimately built a sporting and media empire — before running into legal trouble.
He was the majority shareholder of the sportswear brand Adidas, as well as the owner of the football club Olympique de Marseille, who won the French championship during his ownership.
He also briefly served as the French minister for urban affairs for François Mitterrand’s government from 1992 to 1993.
But Tapie was then found guilty in various cases for corruption, tax fraud and misuse of corporate assets. He spent five months behind bars in 1997 and was prohibited from standing in any French election.
Following his release, he had a stint at acting and hosting gigs on TV and radio.
In 2012, he became a media boss, taking over the southern French daily La Provence and other newspapers.
Now, he is facing a criminal trial over a fraudulent 404 million-euro ($450 million today) arbitration package linked to his sale of Adidas in the 1990s.
