Resumen de France: : Audiovisual creation based on actual events
In a decision delivered on 30 September, the Court of Cassation rejected the appeals brought by the channel Arte and the production companies which produce the programme “Intime Conviction” against the appeal judgment delivered under the urgent procedure ordering them to stop broadcasting the programme on pain of penalty payments (see IRIS 2014-4/15). They had also been ordered to pay a provisional amount towards compensation for the prejudice suffered as a result of the invasion of the privacy of the applicant party, a coroner (medical examiner) who had been taken in for questioning after his wife had been shot dead, before being acquitted in autumn 2013 by a court of assizes, and who had recognised himself in the main character featured in the programme. The “Intime Conviction” programme comprised firstly a TV film shown on 14 February 2014 describing a police investigation carried out following the violent death of a woman and resulting in the arrest of her coroner husband, referred to as “Paul X”. The programme also included a number of videos shown over a period of fifteen days - on an Internet site operated by the company which edited the TV channel - following the case each day in the court of assizes. Internet users could view the file created by the production company and, after each hearing, give their opinion on the innocence or guilt of the accused party; the verdicts of the fictional court of assizes and of Internet users was to be broadcast at the end of the two-week period
