Four car dealers and their manager were sentenced in early January to 825,000 euros in accumulated fines for having participated in a “great fraud” aimed at evading the ecological sanction for the most polluting vehicles, the Marseille prosecutor’s office said Thursday.
In addition to the fine of 25,000 euros that he personally received, the manager of these four car dealerships, which belong to the same group, was also sentenced to twelve months in suspended prison and two years of deprivation of the right to eligibility, according to the note from press of the prosecution, in which it is specified that “the total amount of the confiscations pronounced” on January 10 amounts to 3.1 million euros.
fake records
The five defendants -the owner of the company and the four companies as legal entities-, all of them tried for “acts of fraud committed to the detriment of a public person”, were accused of having carried out “fraudulent maneuvers to avoid payment of the malus “. tax on the most polluting vehicles marketed by the concessionaires”, detailed the same source.
A “massive fraud” that consisted of “falsely registering these vehicles in a special tax exemption regime”, developed the accusation.
The so-called “ecological bonus-malus” system was introduced after the 2007 “Grenelle de l’environnement” to “encourage car buyers to opt for vehicles with less carbon dioxide (CO2)”, which are “favored by aid for the acquisition”, recalls the prosecution. On the other hand, the most polluting cars are penalized with an “ecological penalty”.
But the legislative “hardening” of the system in recent years has given rise to “various bypass strategies” and this “especially among the most consolidated economic players, with the aim of obtaining a competitive advantage in an economic sector in tension”, point again to Marseille parquet flooring.
Source: BFM TV
