These are French translations from Newspapers dealing with Pretory SA.

Inquire.

A whiff of scandal in the French sky

The Pretory company in the collimator of a judge. Words of agents.



Is our air safety reliable ? A file between the hands of justice makes it possible to doubt it. In high-speed motorboat, the private dispensary Pretory, which provides to Air France "agents of safety on significant flights". In other words flying cow-boys, embarking incognito among the passengers in order to neutralize possible terrorists, sedentary response after the attacks from September 11, 2001 in New York. In the case of Pretory, the answer raises more questions than it does not solve any.



Since they know that their employer is in the collimator of a judge, certain badgés wheels Pretory do not hesitate any more to speak, for little that their anonymity is preserved, They are astonished by the laxism which prevails the at the time of recruitment : "Neither psychotechnical test, nor medical examination. One does not even check our criminal records ", is astonished one by them. Many agents do not speak English. Others do not control French. What could they make in the event of attack during a flight ? "Pretory does not place at our disposal of material of intervention. Even not of the bonds of application, explains an agent, that obliges us to buy weapons - which besides are prohibited on board - kind bludgeons, teargas "But there are strong probabilities so that the agent sleeps with closed fists if a terrorist passes to the action : "How do you want that one holds out, considering the rate of the flights ? One can leave for New York Monday, to return to Paris Tuesday, to set out again immediately in Mexico City, to return and to set out again in the same week in Boston... "time Shifts oblige, the cerbères air aéro-are rather confined to bed. As for what they should do in the event of attack ? "In my contract, one spoke about a training course 32 hours. Before my first flight, I had only one brief briefing "the presumedly large arm in costume (dark) and tie (discrete) are often of ex-Os of guarding. They embark without the approval which would enable them to excavate a passenger "One does not even have information on the type of apparatus on which one will work" the professional charts are not systematically recovered by Pretory when it throws its worn agents. How many of these sesames to reach all the airport zones do they circulate without control ? The only tangible mission of these agents, it is to maintain an illusion safety.



The flight (air) is not the only speciality of Pretory which also makes in tax evasion and social. Its agents are declared only 15 hours, whereas they carry out some from 150 to 200 per month. Pretory pours 217 euros. The essence of the wages is transfered from Great Britain. Minables tariffs for Rambo with the reduction.



The company Pretory SA, modestly installed to the 146, street from the Pyrenees, in Paris (20th), is in fact the subsidiary company of a holding American Pretory the USA Inc the former leader of Pretory France has been just unloaded with the profit of William Buck. According to Release of March 19, this American "is old of West Point (school of officers of the American army) and several sources affirm its membership of the FBI, which denies its entourage". We vainly tried to make react William Buck on this subject, but there remain injoignable. As many elements which allowed Duck connected to titrate, March 19 : "the Americans have the high hand on the safety of our airports"



Air France refuses to comment on "a business in progress". The company points out that following a "internal audit" which let appear "anomalies", it "spontaneously" had seized justice. The business takes a new dimension when it appears that consequent money sums forward on the bank accounts of Pretory SA, without obvious relationship with its activities. In a recent complaint, the Collective ATU (which gathers several former employees of the ex-subsidiary company of Air France) is astonished that this company could "be given transfers of foreign origin, in particular for an amount of 400 000 euros, as it arises from the statement of account on December 31, 2002 of the industrial and commercial Credit". Hardly boxed in Paris, the sum was sent back to thirds and in Pretory the USA This curious transaction, a leaned loan, is examined by justice, just like a curious cheque of 50 000 francs which the Pretory company would have established with the order of Joel Cathala, June 11, 1998. The police chief Cathala is the current director of the safety of Air France. It is him which chose Pretory as subcontractor of part of the safety of Air France. From there to imagine a relationship between the aforementioned cheque and this choice... Joel Cathala refused to answer our questions, advancing which it had provided to justice explanations on the "irregularities" which surround this cheque. Nothing indeed makes it possible to dismiss the assumption according to which this cheque would be a forgery, or even as it was boxed. The lawyer of the collective ATU, Jean-Paul Baduel, is astonished that justice puts as many time to solve the question. He recalls that the first complaint implying Pretory goes back to 2001. Deposited in Bobigny, it remained dead letter. From where a new complaint counters X... for obstacle with the operation of justice. Me Baduel is astonished by "the slowness of the instruction, taking into account the clearness of the facts". New hard blow for the parquet floor of Bobigny. The most capable substitute to explain the burial of the complaint of 2001 is currently put in examination for corruption in another business.



Ex-owner of the police force of the air and borders (PAF), the Cathala police chief seems continued by pitches, if not the ill will. Whereas it was in station in the Basque Country, in charge of the coordination of the anti-ETA fight, its name had been evoked in Spain, in the press and in front of the courts, concerning the scandal of the GAL (antiterrorist Group of release), this death squad created by the Spanish government, with solids supports in France. Under cover of fight antiterrorist, the "scabious ones" made 26 assassinations (majority remained unpunished) in France between 1983 and 1986. It was, according to one of the Ministers of Interior Department of the time, Charles Pasqua, specialist in the understatement, "the people paid by a State to come to regulate their accounts on our territory". Gangsters, old OAS, secret agents and cops. Several police officers of the PAF had been shown of corruption by a colleague of the in addition to-Pyrenees, Angel Lopez Carrillo (see Humanity Sunday of May 11, 1995). This officer had revealed us, documents with the support, that its mission was D ' "to come into contact with French police officers in order to tie personal relations with them". The Spanish police officer affirms to have paid "monthly remunerations" with three police officers of the PAF in exchange of information which was to be used to organize the political assassinations of the GAL. Although this testimony belongs to the solid instruction of Garzon judge, no French magistrate did not consider it useful to hear this Spanish police officer. In Spain, the scandal of the GAL led to the judgment of several Ministers and high persons in charge for the civil Guard. In France, where the crimes of the GAL were committed, the scandal was choked. Two of the implied police officers were prematurely torn off with the affection as of theirs. A striking down disease and an unexplained car accident. Third was put in examination, without consequence. Their senior in rank became the Mister safety of Air France.



Serge Keeps

Article published in the edition of April 15, 2003 .

2003-03-19 12:23:14
AIR FRANCE

The history disturbs of Pretory, subcontractor of Air France.


By Cédric MATHIOT

Wednesday March 19, 2003

Between the ex-cop founder of Pretory and the shareholders American who want to unload it, the cross charges of embezzlements start to fuse. ' is definitely on funny of company which the safety of the flights of Air France puts back. Since septem bre 2001, fun of terrorism obliges, the airline company charged the company of safety Pretory, one of its subcontractors, to provide large arm on the flights "at the risks". However, as Libération had written (September 4, 2002), Pretory cumulated the bizarreries. The 150 agents, sometimes of simple gatekeepers of night clubs, were badly ­ or at all ­ formed and paid with the black by a British company of subcontracting. It should have been waited until the factory inspectorate denounces this social do-it-yourself so that Air France requires finally of Pretory, three months ago, the respect of the law. Nothing was done since. With the last news, to compensate for the future stop of subcontracting, Pretory week last proposed to cut of 40 % the wages of its hefty fellows. Result: a grogne of the personnel which made marrer the small world of safety. "the problem of this history, it is that Air France would like to have of the James Bond at the price of Pinot simple cops", has fun a professional.

Ex-cop. After one year and half of amateurism, the business comes however to make its first victim: Jacques Gaussens, founder and owner of Pretory ­ ex-cop erased of the police force considered very on the right ­, have been just made unload, March 6, by his American shareholders. Of what to do everything to return in the order? Yes, ensures Joel Cathala, director of the safety of Air France. Surely not, response a close relation of Jacques Gaussens, who promises a response after the dismissal of the owner, who will be notified on March 25. Between the shareholders and the ex-cop, cross charges of embezzlements start to fuse. And of the bank statements of Pretory revealing of the doubtful financial transfers these times were opportunely diffused. Before perhaps a great unpacking which could wet the company.

Jacques Gaussens creates Pretory ­ modest company of guarding ­ in 1995 and obtains a first small contract with Air France. In 1997, it sees arriving the "Americans" (in fact, a Frenchwoman, former hostess of ATU, Raquel Velasco, and his/her friend of heart, Bill Buck, American soldier reconverted into the businesses). Hardly known in safety, they are it a little in the world of data processing. In 1996, they are then posed as repreneurs of part of Escom ­ leader of the German PC ­ in bankruptcy, before disappearing. What do they come to make in Pretory? Of internal source, it is Joel Cathala (pilot marriage of Velasco and Buck) who brought them ­ what the director of safety denies. The "Americans" unload with a great project: to create a company, Pretory Inc, in the United States, which controls Pretory France, to invest in promising technologies, to dimension the whole in Nasdaq and to touch the jackpot. Gaussens ­ which "measuring rod nothing with the Stock Exchange", according to a close relation ­ "sees already billionaire" and agrees into 1997 to yield its box against 13 % of the capital of Pretory Inc, whose shareholding remains very opaque.

Another point made jaser: Buck is old of West Point (school of officers of the American army), and several sources affirm its membership of the FBI, which denies its entourage (1). He is a president of West Point Society of Paris, and since 1999, Pretory sponsorise annually a sautery of American soldiers in Paris.

Bide. This funny of attachment in any case will be made a place near Air France, raising a number of suspicions of favouritism (to read opposite). A first market (protection of the inheritance of the company) is obtained, then, in September 2001, the market of the embarked agents. In 2002, Pretory reaches a sales turnover of 22 million euros, realized to 80 % with Air France. Side of technologies which the Americans had promised to develop, it is the bide. Thendic France, subsidiary company initially charged to sell a detector of explosive, the CONK, makes a flop. The objective remains the Stock Exchange. A first attempt took place in 1999. For lack of Nasdaq, it will be the OTC, an American secondary market. The course of the Pretory action, of 7 dollars, breaks down in a few days to 30 hundreds. Who is his current level.

Not what to discourage the Americans, taken again the year spent by the virus of data processing. Mow, to date, the subsidiary companies, grassement financed by Pretory, never brought back a kopeck. Thendic Germany and Thendic the USA put the key under the door. And Thendic France (managed by Thierry Velasco, the brother) drag a heavy liability. In short, a beautiful example of diversification. Last episode, Velasco and Buck are creating a company, Genesi, which should repurchase Thendic, but if possible without the liability ­ and will be based in Luxembourg. Fly quiet on Air France, Pretory, its pans and its mysteries, takes care on you.

(1) Bill Buck and Raquel Velasco refused to answer our questions.
A trade unionist of Air France denounces the attribution of markets.

By Renaud LECADRE
Wednesday March 19, 2003

be businesses of the direction of the safety of Air France know a sinuous legal course. No setting in examination was pronounced, but the file seems under high monitoring, since three parquet floors (Pontoise, Bobigny and Paris) are leaning tops, which did not prevent the disappearance of part of the parts.



With the origin, a trade unionist FO had denounced the methods of the direction of safety: "execrable Environment, drives out with the witches against those which refuse to be keep silent." Then it had been interested in the plane tickets distributed by the director of safety, Joel Cathala, with former police colleagues. And finally at the markets of safety passed by Air France. After hearing of the trade unionist in February 2001, within the framework of a preliminary investigation opened in Pontoise, the file had been transmitted to Bobigny, territorialement qualified. There, a member of the parquet floor is astonished by missing parts, "which [ him ] did not arrive to date with the sending of Pontoise", writes it. The trade unionist will have to be heard again in Bobigny to reconstitute the file. Perhaps the current investigation of the inspection of the legal services diligentée after incarcération of Jean-Louis Voirain, prosecutor assistant of Bobigny (to have received certain gifts), will make it possible to see there more clearly.



Comes the episode from the internal audit of Air France on the markets passed by the direction of the safety, which points "each time of the distorsions to the procedure", in particular on the contracts awarded to Pretory, written in December 2000. The company refuses to communicate it to the work's council and even to a police officer of the brigade of repression of the economic delinquency, elected in July 2001 by an instruction express of the parquet floor. In fact, Jean-Cyril Spinetta, president of Air France, wished to give it in hand specific to the public prosecutor. For better following on line the legal treatment which will be made by it? "the company did its work while giving the document to justice", rétorque Air France. The business is today with the hands of a Parisian examining magistrate.

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from http://www.flyingmice.com/cgi-bin/squidcgi/mbthread.pl/amiga/expand/94888

Tax evasion, dubious recruitment, shareholders flight, boss sacked. The methods of Pretory, charged with security on Air France flights, deserve the attention of the law.

By Cedric Mathiot, 28th November 2003 (Libération)

14th September 2001... Over and over again on TV screens, pictures of planes crashing into the twin towers.

For two days, panic and fear of flying emptied the planes. In full torment, Air France is the first company to put security guards on its flights. Pretory, American-financed private security company that already works for Air France gets the contract. Codename for the new recruits: Suraf (Sûreté Air France). In dark suits, armed with plastic handcuffs, their brief is to sit in business class behind the cockpit and prevent terrorist attacks. They are the French cousins of the Sky Marshals that the US government promised at the time to put in force on planes.

A little over 2 years later, the assessment of this operation, which should have reinforced the reputation for reliability of Air France, is deplorable. Pretory was put in receivership 17th November. Financially bled dry, it awaits a new owner and the outcome of the lawsuits involving it. For eighteen months, under cover of guaranteeing the safety/security of Air France passengers, Pretory had profited from an incredible passiveness of the company that thanks to the Suraf project put in place a system of tax evasion. Today, the muscle-men from Pretory, who in 2002 travelled up to 1000 flying hours daily (to the US, Middle East etc), rarely enter the cabins. They spend their time between industrial tribunals and the fraud squad who have called them one by one as witnesses. The founder of Pretory, Jacques Gaussens, has been fired. The majority shareholders have flown to the US. Posing as victims, they are denouncing an affair that is way beyond
Pretory's management.

Mercenaries and bodyguards.

Pierre (1), ex soldier turned bodyguard, was contacted 20 September 2001: A relation rang me 'Pretory, a private company, is building a team to ensure security on board Air France flights'
In the small world of security, the news got around fast. The majority of the troops (who reached nearly 200 agents at the height of the activity) were made up of mercenaries, bodyguards, ex-sportsmen or simply nightclub bouncers. Pierre did his first flight 2 days later. He has now built up more than 4000 flying hours on Air France flights. At the start, there really was fear, a post-11-september effect, everyone was on edge. Then, fairly quickly, we were aware it was nonsense... We were not trained. We had to do outward and return flights, without stopovers and almost without sleep. Obviously, on the return flights, sometimes we slept.

It had to wait 6 months before the surafs were sent in pairs in order to take turns, more than a year before training was established. Another suraf says Half the guys were serious and competent. But there were also shirkers, those who couldn't give a damn. A trainer agreed he left horrified: Some of them didn't speak French... But overall it is the pay that is intriguing. The agents, working over the limit for hours for flying personnel, sometimes worked more than 200 hours a month. But the employees were only paid up to 15 hours by Pretory. The rest was paid by a sub-contractor company, via a bank transfer from a mysterious account, Navarac.

Pretory had already resorted to third-party companies for its ground-based operations for Air France since 1999 (baggage and passenger search etc), but in the case of the surafs, the recourse to sub-contracting reached an unprecedented extent.
Behind Navarac, registered in Tortola (in the British Virgin Islands, Antilles), several other front companies were identified. From an internal source, Pretory billed Air France about 30 euros per hour of flight, sub-contracting to two companies, Vortex and ATR, at 25 euros. These companies, which are associated with Pascal Jumel, ex-investigator of the bandit squad, condemned to 17 years prison for 8 armed robberies, then paid the employees 15 euros per hour, without deducting any charges. Where did the difference go? Who benefited? This went on for more than 18 months. In 2002 alone, the sums transferred to Vortex, based in Guernsey, reached 7 million euros.

Air France did not immediately this suspected robbery. However Joel Cathala, powerful and renowned director of security at Air France, knew the company well. Seconded from the upper ranks of the police, he was the witness at the marriage of the stockholders of Pretory, Raquel Velasco, a former stewardess with UTA, and Bill Buck, ex-US serviceman. This close relationship between the buyer and the subcontractor had already fed rumours about the security market at the heart of the national company. Even before the surafs, an internal audit at Air France from 2000 suggested that the management of security could have favoured certain companies... Including Pretory. In 2002, the security company published business figures of more than 22 million euros, 80% of which was from the airline company. Questioned by Libération, Joel Cathala denied any favouritism.

It had to wait until December 2002 and the angry injunctions of the work inspector before Air France decided finally to react. The company demanded the management of Pretory to clean up. Three months later, in March 2003, one head fell, that of Jacques Gaussens, the founder of Pretory. Air France placed all responsibility for the setup upon him. For the shareholders, Buck promised a new beginning for Pretory. The 1st April, in a letter to Jean-Cyril Spinetta, the CEO of Air France, Buck, who recognised the existence of an illicit and illegal sub-contracting system put into place to his knowledge, assured everything will be done to give you full satisfaction and clear your name.

Two new directors were hired and plunged, according to them, into the deep sh*t of this business. The sub-contract was halted. Air France tried to clean up a bit. Last April, Air France requested from us lists of the agents who had flown, said one of the new directors. Out of about 120 'surafs', 77 were unknown to the company, who therefore did not know who had been on its aeroplanes! After inquiries into their background, the management of security asked us to forbid about 30 of them from flight... Amongst these agents, some had criminal records. Thus began the incredible revolt of the club of 32 which says a lot about the atmosphere of amateurishness: for a month these surafs stirred up ill-feeling at the headquarters of Pretory. We were threatened, surrounded. And when you see the size of these beasts, you're scared said one of the current managers of the company. Panicked, the American shareholders called upon a mediator for help. Between May and June, an ex-legionnaire (who was armed) tried to calm the protestors, while four burly guards protected the headquarters. Finally, some of these surafs received several thousand euros in exchange for a signature promising that they would not sue Pretory.

4.4 million tax recovery.

However, the attempt to bring Pretory back into line appeared already doomed to failure. The end of subcontracting had increased costs: from April, the suraf project lost money. Processes filed by the industrial tribunal cost the company more than 2 million euros. Added to that, there are 4.4 million euros of recovered tax, from irregular bills to the sub-contractors. Worried by rumours of drained assets, the unions filed an injunction for access to the company accounts. Finally, Air France used Pretory less and less, arguing that the increased presence of armoured cockpits allows us to reduce reliance on surafs. Unable to balance the accounts after eighteen months of fiddling, Pretory collapsed. At the end of July, the US shareholders left. A director said They told us: 'we are going on vacation to the US. We'll return in August'... They have never returned to France. On leaving, Bill Buck and Raquel Velasco forgot to reimburse Pretory, despite their promise, nearly 2.5 million euros transferred to a subsidiary, Thendic, managed by Raquel Velasco's brother. The unions viewed this as theft, knowing that Thendic had just been merged with a German company to make Genesi, an IT enterprise based in Luxembourg, directed by Bill Buck. The day after the announcement of Pretory going into receivership, Buck announced on the Internet the transfer of shares from Thendic to Genesi.

Questioned by Libération, Bill Buck did not want to explain. Posing as a victim of an incredible business, he confirmed only that from the member when Pretory was put back in order, he had had to fight against a system that didn't allow him to survive... Pretory had until 31 December to find a new owner.
More than 500 employees' jobs are at risk, the majority on the ground; some have been employed right from the start, long before the millions of euros of the suraf project triggered the fall of the company. The preliminary enquiry is underway. Air France has refused to reply to our questions on the demise of their subcontractor.