Commando Erignac: the Court of Appeal grants semi-freedom to Pierre Alessandri

The anti-terrorist sentence enforcement chamber of the Paris Court of Appeal delivered its decision on Tuesday, January 31. The semi-freedom project presented by Pierre Alessandri was accepted.

This Tuesday, January 31, the sentencing chamber of the Paris Court of Appeal delivered its judgment: the court gives its agreement to the semi-freedom project presented by Pierre Alessandri, the public prosecutor’s office announced to AFP .

This project provides for authorization to leave during the day to work in an agricultural company located in Ponte-Novu, with a return to detention each evening.

Sentenced to life imprisonment in 2003 for the assassination of the prefect Claude Erignac, Pierre Alessandri has been imprisoned for nearly 24 years. Released since 2017 after having served his eighteen years of security period, he had been asking for a sentence adjustment for several years.

“It’s a huge relief after so many years of fighting to get this parole”reacted his lawyer Eric Barbolosi.

“It is only the strict application of what is the law attached to the adjustment of sentence, it is not at all a measure of favor, Pierre Alessandri fulfilled all the criteria, he points out. It is completely normal and logical that he should benefit from this conditional release, what was not normal and logical was that he did not benefit from it. All of this was made possible because for the first time, theEtat applied a principle of neutrality. And this is thanks to the mobilization of all the Corsican people, elected officials, all tendencies combined.

Three times, the court for the application of anti-terrorist sentences (Tapat) had given the green light to conditional release with probationary semi-freedom, but the decisions had been systematically overturned on appeal after a suspensive appeal by the national anti-terrorist prosecution (Pnat).

This new decision comes after the Court of Cassation, last October, quashed the judgment of the Paris Court of Appeal dated October 7, 2021. For the high court, the sentencing chamber of the Paris Court of Appeal had not sufficiently justified its refusal to release, justified by a risk of “disturbance to public order”. It had therefore ordered the re-examination of this request.

As a reminder, Pierre Alessandri like Alain Ferrandi, the two members of the Erignac commando still imprisoned, were transferred in April 2022 to the Corsican prison of Borgo after the lifting of their status as “particularly reported detainees”, a promise from the executive after the fatal attack on Yvan Colonna in Arles prison.

Alain Ferrandi, who was also refused several adjustments to his sentence, will be fixed on February 23 on his last request for parole.

The repeated refusals of the requests for conditional release of the two men weighed heavily in stopping the negotiations around the institutional development of the island. On September 29, the Assembly of Corsica had suspended its work after a new rejection of Pierre Alessandri’s request.

After this new decision, this time favorable, will discussions between Paris and Corsica resume? According to our information, the Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin could organize his next trip to Corsica on February 6, on the occasion of the commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the death of the prefect Erignac, assassinated on February 6, 1998 in Ajaccio.

Find the portrait of Pierre Alessandri by Marc-Antoine Renucci: