Judo coach Alain Schmitt again released from acts of domestic violence on his ex-girlfriend Margaux Pinot – Liberation

The Paris Court of Appeal has rendered its judgment in the Pinot-Schmitt case, opposing judoka Margaux Pinot and her former trainer and companion, Alain Schmitt.

The legal fight does not turn to the advantage of the judoka Margaux Pinot. His former trainer and companion, Alain Schmitt, was again released this Friday by the Paris Court of Appeal of the acts of domestic violence of which he was accused. As in the first instance, the prosecution had requested on appeal a one-year suspended prison sentence for the judoka. The reasons for the judgment have not yet been communicated.

The two athletes have been tearing each other apart for six months on the benches of the courts and through the media. The trigger: a violent altercation that occurred the night of November 26 to 27, 2021, at Blanc-Mesnil (Seine-Saint-Denis), at the young woman’s home, and for which the athlete had already been released last December.

At the end of the hearing, Alain Schmitt – who could give a press conference in the coming days – rejoiced “that the magistrates have shown common sense“. Margaux Pinot was not present at the Court of Appeal and did not wish to react to the decision, said her lawyer, Rachid Madid.

Conflicting accounts

The two athletes accuse each other of violence, giving contradictory accounts of the altercation. The day after Alain Schmitt’s first release in December, Margaux Pinot posted a photo of her swollen face on social networks, accusing the man with whom she had a secret relationship of having “thrashing“. The photo caused a scandal, propelling the sportswoman into an emblematic victim of unpunished violence against women.

For his part, Alain Schmitt denounces the “media lynching” and maintains that it was a “chiffonnade“, where the two are made “big percussion”. Many bruises are observed the following days on the two protagonists. But without an image or direct witness to the facts, the file remains confined to the stories of two athletes. The release of Alain Schmitt had aroused such indignation in French judo that the Bobigny prosecution had decided to appeal. But during the second trial, in April, neither of the two athletes had changed their statements, each camping on their version of the events that occurred that November night at the judoka’s home.