Olivier Metzner (22 November 1949 – 17 March 2013) was a French criminal lawyer.
Early life
Metzner was born into a simple farming
Protestant
Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
family from Champ-Haut, Orne. which had fled Prussia in the nineteenth century. Metzner had a brother who became a scientist and a sister who became a teacher.Kim Willsher Top French lawyer Olivier Metzner's body found near private island ''The Guardian'', 17 March 2013
Metzner became interested in law after reading
Franz Kafka
Franz Kafka (3 July 1883 – 3 June 1924) was a German-speaking Bohemian novelist and short-story writer, widely regarded as one of the major figures of 20th-century literature. His work fuses elements of realism and the fantastic. It ...
and a newspaper story about a shepherd with limited language skills who was sentenced to death. He studied law in
Caen
Caen (, ; nrf, Kaem) is a commune in northwestern France. It is the prefecture of the department of Calvados. The city proper has 105,512 inhabitants (), while its functional urban area has 470,000, before moving to Paris where he became a lawyer in 1975.
Legal practice
Metzner was a recognized specialist in criminal law cases, particularly known for his ability to detect defects in procedure and freeing clients on technicalities.Gregory Viscus French Lawyer Olivier Metzner Found Dead of Apparent Suicide Bloomberg 17 March 2013
Metzner represented the interests of many individuals or companies in court;
Loïk Le Floch-Prigent
Loik Le Floch-Prigent (born 21 September 1943 in Brest) is a French engineer and manager. He was CEO of Elf Aquitaine between July 1989 and 1993, then president of SNCF from December 1995 to July 1996, when he was indicted in connection with the ...
,
Jean-Marie Messier
Jean-Marie Messier (born 13 December 1956) is a French businessman who was chairman and chief executive of the multinational media conglomerate Vivendi (formerly Vivendi Universal) until 2002. He is also frequently referred to by the nickname "J2 ...
, Jacques Crozemarie,
Timothy Koogle
Timothy Andrew Koogle (born July 5, 1951) is an American executive who served as the first CEO and President of web company Yahoo! between 1995 and 2001. He served as the company's chairman from 1999 to 2003. He was named to the Top 25 Executives ...
CEO of
Yahoo!
Yahoo! (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web services provider. It is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California and operated by the namesake company Yahoo Inc., which is 90% owned by investment funds managed by Apollo Global Man ...
, Patrick Puy former CEO of
Moulinex
Moulinex is a Groupe SEB brand along with Rowenta, Calor, All-Clad, Lagostina, Krups, and Tefal, all household products brands. The company designed and produced the Mouli grater. The company was founded by Jean Mantelet who in 1932 invented the ...
, the
Bouygues
Bouygues S.A. () is a French industrial group headquartered in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, 8th arrondissement of Paris, France. Bouygues is listed on the Euronext, Euronext Paris exchange and is a blue chip (stock market), blue chip in the C ...
group,
Continental Airlines
Continental Airlines, simply known as Continental, was a major United States airline founded in 1934 and eventually headquartered in Houston, Texas. It had ownership interests and brand partnerships with several carriers.
Continental started o ...
for the
Air France Flight 4590
On 25 July 2000, Air France Flight 4590, a Concorde passenger jet on an international charter flight from Paris to New York, crashed shortly after takeoff, killing all 109 people on board and four on the ground. It was the only fatal Concorde a ...
crash, the company that issued RINA certificates of seaworthiness of the Erika, Pierre-Yves Gilleron, a defendant in the Elysée wiretapping scandal,
Bertrand Cantat
Bertrand Cantat (born 5 March 1964) is a French songwriter, singer, and musician known for being the former frontman of the rock band Noir Désir. In 2003, he was proven guilty without a doubt and convicted of the murder ("murder with indirect in ...
,
Florent Pagny
Florent Pagny (born 6 November 1961) is a French singer-songwriter, musician and actor. He records his work in French, as well as in Italian, Spanish and English. His greatest hits include " N'importe quoi", " Savoir aimer" and " Ma Liberté de ...
,
Jérôme Kerviel
Jérôme Kerviel (; born 1977) is a French rogue trader who was convicted and imprisoned in the 2008 Société Générale trading loss for breach of trust, forgery and unauthorized use of the bank's computers, resulting in losses valued at € ...
,
Dominique de Villepin
Dominique Marie François René Galouzeau de Villepin (; born 14 November 1953) is a French politician who served as Prime Minister of France from 31 May 2005 to 17 May 2007 under President Jacques Chirac.
In his career working at the Minist ...
,
Nike
Nike often refers to:
* Nike (mythology), a Greek goddess who personifies victory
* Nike, Inc., a major American producer of athletic shoes, apparel, and sports equipment
Nike may also refer to:
People
* Nike (name), a surname and feminine given ...
Panama
Panama ( , ; es, link=no, Panamá ), officially the Republic of Panama ( es, República de Panamá), is a transcontinental country spanning the southern part of North America and the northern part of South America. It is bordered by Cos ...
nian president,
Manuel Noriega
Manuel Antonio Noriega Moreno (; February 11, 1934 – May 29, 2017) was a Panamanian dictator, politician and military officer who was the ''de facto'' List of heads of state of Panama, ruler of Panama from 1983 to 1989. An authoritaria ...
. In April 1994, he was the lawyer for Miss Luong Kwan Yin (Tong Yen Restaurant) which became the case of the French Republic – 17 May 2002 – in the Swiss Federal Court in
. Metzner was to represent ousted Tunisian president Ben Ali
wife
A wife (plural, : wives) is a female in a marital relationship. A woman who has separated from her partner continues to be a wife until the marriage is legally Dissolution (law), dissolved with a divorce judgement. On the death of her partner, ...
's nephew,
Imed Trabelsi
Imed Trabelsi ( ar, عماد الطرابلسي; born August 26, 1974 in Tunis) is a businessman, politician, and favorite nephew of Leïla Ben Ali, the former First Lady of Tunisia, Trabelsi was formerly the mayor of La Goulette, Tunisia. Under ...
, but Tunisian law did not allow foreign lawyers.
Metzner was also involved in cases at the request or on behalf of the RPR, PS, PC, Corsican separatists, the
Church of Scientology
The Church of Scientology is a group of interconnected corporate entities and other organizations devoted to the practice, administration and dissemination of Scientology, which is variously defined as a cult, a scientology as a business, bu ...
, the Council of the College of Physicians, in the case of "fake voters of the third arrondissement of Paris" and a group of French citizens jailed in the
Dominican Republic
The Dominican Republic ( ; es, República Dominicana, ) is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean region. It occupies the eastern five-eighths of the island, which it shares wit ...
for cocaine trafficking.
Metzner purchased Boëdic Island in the
Gulf of Morbihan
The Gulf of Morbihan is a natural harbour on the coast of the department of Morbihan in southern Brittany, France. Its English name is taken from the French version, ''le golfe du Morbihan'', though it would be more precisely called 'the Mo ...
of
Brittany
Brittany (; french: link=no, Bretagne ; br, Breizh, or ; Gallo language, Gallo: ''Bertaèyn'' ) is a peninsula, Historical region, historical country and cultural area in the west of modern France, covering the western part of what was known ...
, France in September 2010 for €2.5 million, then put it on sale in November 2012 for €10 million.
In February 2011, he was the family lawyer for Laëtitia Perrais, murdered in
Pornic
Pornic (; ''Pornizh'' in Breton, ''Port-Nitz'' in Gallo) is a commune in the Loire-Atlantique department in western France.
In 1973 the commune of Pornic absorbed the neighbouring municipalities of Sainte-Marie-sur-Mer and Clion-sur-Mer.
Populat ...
on 19 January 2011.
In September 2012, Metzner represented the country of
Equatorial Guinea
Equatorial Guinea ( es, Guinea Ecuatorial; french: Guinée équatoriale; pt, Guiné Equatorial), officially the Republic of Equatorial Guinea ( es, link=no, República de Guinea Ecuatorial, french: link=no, République de Guinée équatoria ...
in the French court concerning "ill-gotten gains".
Metzner was named France's most powerful lawyer by ''GQ'' magazine in 2012.
In February 2013, he appeared before the Paris Criminal Court, defending the Swiss oil group Vitol, defendant in the trial for misappropriation of the UN "oil for food" program in Iraq.
Death
On 17 March 2013, Metzner's body was found floating near the Boëdic island in Gulf of Morbihan. Metzner's death was believed to be self-inflicted and he left behind a note in his nearby residence. Metzner never married and was survived by no offspring.Stéphane Durand-Souffland La dernière énigme de Me Olivier Metzner Le Figaro, 17 March 2013