A Riviera village and the law of silence

Written by Reporter - May 2007

An everyday story of country folk

“You can feel the atmosphere, it’s pure Corsica, including the law of silence.” So concluded a Parisian journalist after spending a couple of hours in Castellar. Well, some hacks get paid to write that way. More shockingly, a senior legal official told a jury in open court that the Alpes-Maritimes village had “something unhealthy and mafia-like about it”. That’s not exactly the impression our man had when he was there earlier this year to prepare our first “Our Village” feature. But why was Castellar, perched high above Menton, in the news again? As frequenters of local French media will know, a man was on trial for a murder committed there fifteen years ago.

Briefly, one August morning in 1991 Pierre Leschiera, a young shepherd, was ambushed at dawn as he rode his mountain-bike to rejoin his flock and shot, first in the back and then finished off with another blast of buckshot to the head. Suspicion immediately attached to the Verrando family, big noises in the village and leaders of the hunting fraternity, with whom Lesciera had an envenomed relationship. Even by French standards the investigation was slow and it was only in 2002 that Alain Verrando was put on trial for the killing. He was acquitted but the prosecution’s appeal is still pending. Then, in April Alain’s nephew Jerôme (not yet seventeen at the time of the crime) was brought to court on the same charge. He was acquitted and again the prosecution has appealed. They say possibly both appeals could be heard together.

So what to make of all this? Certainly, a man died through an act of brutal violence. However, to relate this to a fantasy about a “Corsican” and “mafia-like” atmosphere is nonsense. What were typical inter-personal tensions within a close-knit community took a tragic turn. Given the strength of communal and familial loyalties in such places clearing up this now very old case would seem nigh impossible. Most castellarois would like to see the whole matter laid to rest. Yet another slice of courtroom drama they see as a waste of time and money. We’d agree. Great for lawyers, though.

From Riviera Reporter Issue 121, June/July 2007

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