Since Monday, April 7, the Vesoul Judicial Court in Haute-Saône has focused on suspicions of work hidden in the field of road transport. The former French road carrier Gefco is continued for having benefited from an illegal system of loan from drivers from Eastern Europe, employees in France under unworthy conditions.
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“Gefco knows knowingly at hidden work” by subcontracting the employment of drivers from Eastern Europe to four companies – a French -based French -based, two Polish and a Slovak ” – estimated the director of investigation of the Central Office for the Correction Office (OCLTI) before the Correctional Court.
These four companies are suspected of not having paid their social contributions in France. In this file which concerns 35 employees, URSSAF estimates its damage to at least 853,000 euros.
Two entities of the former French carrier – bought in 2022 by the maritime transport giant CMA -CGM -, SA GEFCO and SAS SASU Gefco France, are continued, for these facts dating back to the period July 2014 – February 2018.
The company, which specializes in the delivery of cars on trucks, was the historic partner of the PSA automotive group, which has become Stellantis.
A Polish company and five executives of subcontracting companies have appeared since Monday alongside Gefco for “execution in an organized gang of concealed work”. They are also prosecuted for “submission of several vulnerable people to unworthy working conditions”.
The case had started in January 2017 with a report from the Regional Directorate of Environment, Planning and Housing (DREAL).
The gendarmerie had discovered around thirty Slovak and Polish drivers who transited “in unworthy” conditions on a logistics basis in Quincey (Haute-Saône): they were housed in dilapidated bungalows, affected by water and mold infiltrations, with unsanitary sanitary facilities.
The drivers were employed by foreign companies and made available to Gefco Vesoul.
The president of the court requested against Gefco his Europe, which has since become a partial relaxation for the facts committed after January 1, 2015, which has become the condemnation of the carrier for the offense of appeal by legal person to the services of a person exercising hidden work, for the acts committed between July 10, 2014 and January 1, 2015, a penalty of a fine, One month at the company’s head office.
Contrary to a Frenchman, Christian Haas, an Alsatian considered as the main organizer of this fraud and having already carried out pre -trial detention, the court requires its conviction to 12 months’ suspended imprisonment, € 100,000 fine and prohibition of final management. He considers it guilty of the hidden work crimes in organized gang and crimes linked to the working conditions unworthy of employees.
The two leaders of the transport company based in Alsace, Christian and Camille Haas, who are among the defendants, were shareholders of the three foreign companies involved. Christian Haas was aware of the unhealthiness of the Quincey logistics base, according to the OCLTI investigations. “All our activity was perfectly transparent,” defended the 63 -year -old man at the helm, implicated by the other executives.
A foreign subcontracting company, the company Turkski is also considered by the court as guilty of concealed work in organized gang and provision of employees of unworthy premises, between July 10, 2014 and February 26, 2018. 180,000 € fine have required.
Three Polish and Slovak women are found guilty of the same facts. The court requires fines ranging from 25,000 euros for each of them, and prohibition of management for 5 years.
The trial is due to end this Thursday. The judgment will only be rendered on July 3.
With AFP and Frédéric Buridant