Update on the Vegan Baby separated from his Mother by Authorities in Nice, France
Guénady
December 11, 2009
Last October 29, the Appeals Court in Aix-en-Provence heard the case of two-year-old Elie, forcibly separated from his mother, Séverine Gérard, both Belgian citizens, last March 23 by the Municipal Police in Nice, on the suspicion of endangering the baby's health by 'imposing' on him a vegan diet. As an afterthought, apparently, Séverine was also accused of being an SDF (a homeless person) with her baby on the streets of Nice.
This complicated case merits some 'setting straight' of the record, due to the false accusations leveled at Séverine, all of which she has answered.
She was accused of having lied about being an artist. While most of her paintings remain in Belgium, five, painted in Nice after her son was forcibly taken from her, went on exposition at the local vegan restaurant, where they remained on public view for two and a half months. A certificate to this effect was produced for the Court.
Séverine was accused of having lied about having a university degree, so she produced for the Court a certificate from her Belgian university attesting to her degree in psychology. She tells us that she also produced a written certificate from the head psychiatrist at the institution in Belgium where she successfully completed her one year's internship.
Regarding the 'dangers' of the vegan diet 'imposed' on Elie, Séverine did not have to answer this charge again, the file containing, since the July 15 audience in Nice, the testimonies from scores of vegans from around the world who rallied to the grassroots call for solidarity, providing personal accounts of the benefits of the vegan diet for themselves and for their children. As well, the Physcian's Committee for Responsible Medicine in the US provided Séverine with a copy of the American Dietetic Association's report on Veganism and Vegetarianism (concluding that a vegan diet is appropriate for all age groups, from pregnancy to old age). The Prosecution in Aix wisely did not raise this issue again, so that the opinion of the doctor in Nice who supported the Nice judge's claim of danger (according to Séverine, this doctor affirmed for the judge that, 'A vegan diet causes micro-lesions in the brain, invisible to the naked eye, and which only become evident in adulthood'), this claim can now be consigned to the 'oubliettes', and justly forgotten.
As for the accusation that Séverine aggressed the foster family with whom her baby had been placed, an 'aggression' for which she was interned at the Nice psychiatric hospital, it apparently sufficed for the Court to note that all charges against her for this 'aggression' were dropped (her version of the event relates that, on the contrary, she was aggressed by the father of the foster family, and both her lawyer and the doctor who examined her after her arrest attest that she was covered in bruises... That and the fact that there were numerous witnesses to this event would seem to bear out her version and to explain why charges were dropped). The Nice psychiatric hospital, which subjected her to the usual neuroleptic drug therapy for patients interned against their will, nevertheless released her after a month, saying they could not continue to hold her as she is not 'psychiatrically ill'.
Concerning the charge of being a homeless person, Séverine tells us that she produced evidence that during her stays in Nice, where she has spent time over the last three years, between her world travels (Equador, Greece, India...), she often paid for hotel rooms for herself and her son, and that she was also often taken in and lodged by friends. She was not permanently installed in Nice and she had no intention of staying permanently in Nice, so she did not seek to rent an apartment. Séverine tells us she informed the Court that once, during a few days before her trip to India, she was put up in a comfortable tent on the beach which was under the direct surveillance of the night security guard at the neighboring beachfront commerce. It should be noted that this was at a time when many homeless people had installed tents on the beach to protest the lack of 'social housing' in Nice (where the authorities are accused of keeping low-cost social housing closed, rather than to encourage 'poor' people to come to live in the city).
Séverine tells us that she produced evidence for the Court that she has more than sufficient ready funds and income to provide for her needs and for the needs of her son.
She relates that the seeming prejudice against her expressed by one of the judges at the appeals hearing upset her so much that she reacted, declaring her dsappointment in France, which claims to be the 'Pays des Droits de l'Homme' (the country which invented the idea of Human Rights), while her Human Rights have been so little respected here.
Conscious that things were not looking too good, Séverine's faith in the French Justice System (and ours) was nevertheless restored when the Aix Procureur delivered his summing up.
Is Séverine obstinate, eccentric, outspoken and a general nuisance, she tells us he asked the judges. Yes, he answered for them. 'But is she a danger for her son? No!' Qualifying the forced removal of Elie and his placement in a foster family as an 'enlèvement' (a kidnapping), Séverine tells us that he said that she had had a mistaken idea of France (!) and that now she has learned that this country 'does not suit her'. She should, he declared, have her son returned to her, so that they can leave together.
The decision of the judges, delivered November 13, was in agreement, and Elie was returned to Séverine on Wednesday, November 18.
We can only hope that Séverine does take her Elie away with her, elsewhere, to another place, where the citizens have more personal liberty, even if they are foreigners, women, alone, single mothers, artists living an alternative lifestyle, and vegan.
Séverine also told us that she has learned that the foster family, who submitted a petition to the Court to adopt Elie almost immediately after his placement with them, are personal friends of Nice's mayor. But that must surely be just a coincidence...
This complicated case merits some 'setting straight' of the record, due to the false accusations leveled at Séverine, all of which she has answered.
She was accused of having lied about being an artist. While most of her paintings remain in Belgium, five, painted in Nice after her son was forcibly taken from her, went on exposition at the local vegan restaurant, where they remained on public view for two and a half months. A certificate to this effect was produced for the Court.
Séverine was accused of having lied about having a university degree, so she produced for the Court a certificate from her Belgian university attesting to her degree in psychology. She tells us that she also produced a written certificate from the head psychiatrist at the institution in Belgium where she successfully completed her one year's internship.
Regarding the 'dangers' of the vegan diet 'imposed' on Elie, Séverine did not have to answer this charge again, the file containing, since the July 15 audience in Nice, the testimonies from scores of vegans from around the world who rallied to the grassroots call for solidarity, providing personal accounts of the benefits of the vegan diet for themselves and for their children. As well, the Physcian's Committee for Responsible Medicine in the US provided Séverine with a copy of the American Dietetic Association's report on Veganism and Vegetarianism (concluding that a vegan diet is appropriate for all age groups, from pregnancy to old age). The Prosecution in Aix wisely did not raise this issue again, so that the opinion of the doctor in Nice who supported the Nice judge's claim of danger (according to Séverine, this doctor affirmed for the judge that, 'A vegan diet causes micro-lesions in the brain, invisible to the naked eye, and which only become evident in adulthood'), this claim can now be consigned to the 'oubliettes', and justly forgotten.
As for the accusation that Séverine aggressed the foster family with whom her baby had been placed, an 'aggression' for which she was interned at the Nice psychiatric hospital, it apparently sufficed for the Court to note that all charges against her for this 'aggression' were dropped (her version of the event relates that, on the contrary, she was aggressed by the father of the foster family, and both her lawyer and the doctor who examined her after her arrest attest that she was covered in bruises... That and the fact that there were numerous witnesses to this event would seem to bear out her version and to explain why charges were dropped). The Nice psychiatric hospital, which subjected her to the usual neuroleptic drug therapy for patients interned against their will, nevertheless released her after a month, saying they could not continue to hold her as she is not 'psychiatrically ill'.
Concerning the charge of being a homeless person, Séverine tells us that she produced evidence that during her stays in Nice, where she has spent time over the last three years, between her world travels (Equador, Greece, India...), she often paid for hotel rooms for herself and her son, and that she was also often taken in and lodged by friends. She was not permanently installed in Nice and she had no intention of staying permanently in Nice, so she did not seek to rent an apartment. Séverine tells us she informed the Court that once, during a few days before her trip to India, she was put up in a comfortable tent on the beach which was under the direct surveillance of the night security guard at the neighboring beachfront commerce. It should be noted that this was at a time when many homeless people had installed tents on the beach to protest the lack of 'social housing' in Nice (where the authorities are accused of keeping low-cost social housing closed, rather than to encourage 'poor' people to come to live in the city).
Séverine tells us that she produced evidence for the Court that she has more than sufficient ready funds and income to provide for her needs and for the needs of her son.
She relates that the seeming prejudice against her expressed by one of the judges at the appeals hearing upset her so much that she reacted, declaring her dsappointment in France, which claims to be the 'Pays des Droits de l'Homme' (the country which invented the idea of Human Rights), while her Human Rights have been so little respected here.
Conscious that things were not looking too good, Séverine's faith in the French Justice System (and ours) was nevertheless restored when the Aix Procureur delivered his summing up.
Is Séverine obstinate, eccentric, outspoken and a general nuisance, she tells us he asked the judges. Yes, he answered for them. 'But is she a danger for her son? No!' Qualifying the forced removal of Elie and his placement in a foster family as an 'enlèvement' (a kidnapping), Séverine tells us that he said that she had had a mistaken idea of France (!) and that now she has learned that this country 'does not suit her'. She should, he declared, have her son returned to her, so that they can leave together.
The decision of the judges, delivered November 13, was in agreement, and Elie was returned to Séverine on Wednesday, November 18.
We can only hope that Séverine does take her Elie away with her, elsewhere, to another place, where the citizens have more personal liberty, even if they are foreigners, women, alone, single mothers, artists living an alternative lifestyle, and vegan.
Séverine also told us that she has learned that the foster family, who submitted a petition to the Court to adopt Elie almost immediately after his placement with them, are personal friends of Nice's mayor. But that must surely be just a coincidence...
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