“At the request of the lawyers who have estimated, given the numerous documents that they will produce, that the case cannot last one day, it will probably be postponed to a hearing over three days in April,” said indicated the magistrate, specifying that the new hearing date would probably be announced next Thursday.
For years, Mulhouse Olympic Swimming (MON), a prestigious French swimming club run by the Horter family, was largely subsidized by the Mulhouse agglomeration (Mulhouse alsace agglomération, M2A), its main financier (480,000 euros in subsidies annually between 2015 and 2019). In a report published last June, the Grand Est regional chamber of accounts pointed out the club’s “heavy dependence” on subsidies (between 64 and 73% of its operating revenue), the “equivocal and confused” relations between the club and the agglomeration, and the absence of “control of the proper use of the funds paid”.
The president of the association, Franck Horter, the main coach of the club, Lionel Horter, his wife, Marjorie Horter, and his mother, Marie Octavie Horter, former vice-president of the French Swimming Federation (FFN), are thus dismissed before the court, the latter for more minor facts. In addition to misuse of corporate assets, they are dismissed for breach of trust, presentation of inaccurate balance sheets and concealment of these crimes. All for several hundred thousand euros. Furthermore, Ms. Roux-Morizot announced on Friday that she had closed the complaint which had been filed last August against the MON by the anti-corruption association AC!! for illegal taking of interests and favoritism.
Mulhouse Olympic Swimming is the former club of Roxana Maracineanu, the first French world champion and former Minister of Sports (2018-2022). It also saw Olympic champions Laure Manaudou, Yannick Agnel and Amaury Leveaux pass by.
