Rugby player Mohamed Haouas, ex-player of Montpellier and the XV of France, was sentenced on Friday June 30 to eighteen months in prison, nine of which are closed, for “aggravated violence”.
This is a separate case from that for which he was sentenced on May 30 to one year in prison (for violence committed against his wife). The facts with which he was charged in this new decision date back to 1er January 2014, when he took part, under the influence of alcohol, in a violent fight in a bakery. A brawl had pitted him and a dozen friends against the owner of a nightclub.
This new conviction of the pillar makes possible an incarceration of the player, according to his lawyer, Marc Gallix. The decision itself “is not harsh”because “we can see that he is the most virulent of all, that he deals very violent blows” during this fight, admitted Mr.e Gallix. “But the sentences can only be adjusted up to one year in prison. If we add today’s nine months firm to the twelve months for domestic violence, if I do not appeal and the sentence becomes final, he is incarcerated.continued the player’s lawyer, absent at the hearing on Friday.
Marc Gallix has therefore announced his intention to appeal so that his client can first serve his twelve-month prison sentence in a modified form while the Court of Appeal renders its conclusions.
Mohamed Haouas and his lawyer spoke on Monday with the sentencing judge, who must decide in the fall on the form of his conviction for domestic violence. He could be forced to wear an electronic bracelet or be placed in “parental parole”according to his lawyer, Mohamed Haouas being the father of two young children and breadwinner.
This second option, probably accompanied by a psychological follow-up and an awareness course on domestic violence, is “preferable” to that involving the wearing of an electronic bracelet, because it would allow the 29-year-old player to“doing one’s job”explained M.e Gallix.
The rest of his very uncertain career
The career of Mohamed Houas is precisely uncertain, even if he won a first legal victory on Monday June 26. The industrial tribunal has, in fact, dismissed, in summary proceedings, the ASM Clermont Auvergne club of its request to suspend the employment contract of the pillar, who had been recruited by the Auvergne club before the acts of violence against his wife and was to join the team at 1er July.
At the hearing, the club’s lawyer claimed that ASM had been “cheated” by the player and the Montpellier club: “This is not the profile we hired”while Mr. Haouas has a duty to “respect the ethical and deontological criteria of French rugby”. Mohamed Haouas is not “not a product but a rugby player” to which “we want to ban working and feeding our families”, had replied the advice of Mohamed Haouas. On this subject, a hearing on the merits must take place in September.
Following the violent attack on his wife, Mohamed Haouas had not been summoned by the coach of the France team, Fabien Galthié, for the World Cup which begins in France in September.
