Diana paparazzi face retrial
2004-06-22 13:28
Paris - Three photographers who were part of the press pack that chased Princess Diana on the night of her fatal car accident in Paris in 1997 are to be retried on Tuesday for invasion of privacy.
The new hearing, seven months after they were acquitted in an earlier trial, was the result of an appeal lodged by Mohamed Al-Fayed, the father of Diana's boyfriend Dodi, and state prosecutors.
Fabrice Chassery, Jacques Langevin and Christian Martinez are accused of taking six photos of Diana and Dodi as the couple lay in the wreckage of their Mercedes in a Paris tunnel.
Even though the photos were never published, lawyers for Al-Fayed - an Egyptian millionaire who owns the Harrod's department store in London and the Ritz hotel in Paris - argue they violated French privacy laws.
French inquest
Diana, 36, and Dodi Al-Fayed, 42, died on the night of August 31, 1997. Their chauffeur Henri Paul, who also died, was found in the official French inquest to have been responsible for the crash because he was driving at high speed with alcohol in his blood.
Chassery, a freelance photographer at the time, Langevin, who worked for the Sygma/Corbis agency, and Martinez of the Angeli agency, were originally cleared of the charges against them when a court determined that they did not photograph any intimate moments and that the inside of a car did not constitute a private place.
The US television network CBS in April showed indistinct black-and-white pictures of Diana dying in the car wreck, drawing expressions of shock and anger from Diana's family and Al-Fayed. The network said it had obtained the images from a copy of the confidential French investigation into the accident, but gave no other details as to their source.
Al-Fayed's persistent claims that the couple was murdered has prompted two investigations currently underway in Britain. In April this year, Britain's most senior police officer, John Stevens, visited the Paris tunnel where the accident occurred. Stevens spent 20 minutes in the underpass by the Alma bridge over the river Seine, accompanied by the British royal coroner Michael Burgess, who ordered his investigation.
He described his inspection - carried out in the glare of British media - as "extremely valuable", and said he hoped to wrap up his investigation by the end of the year.
Murder allegations have centred on claims that the British establishment may have wanted to get rid of Diana because she was having a romantic liaison with a Muslim man.