{"id":142168,"date":"2018-06-16T20:06:58","date_gmt":"2018-06-16T20:06:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/english\/france-telecom-suicides-former-bosses-face-trial\/"},"modified":"2018-06-16T20:06:58","modified_gmt":"2018-06-16T20:06:58","slug":"france-telecom-suicides-former-bosses-face-trial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/english\/france-telecom-suicides-former-bosses-face-trial\/","title":{"rendered":"France Telecom suicides: Former bosses face trial"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure>                                  <img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Didier Lombard in 2010\" src=\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/320\/cpsprodpb\/104ED\/production\/_102079766_mediaitem102077072.jpg\"\/>Image copyright                  AFP<figcaption>Image caption                                      Didier Lombard denies his reforms led staff to take their own lives                              <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p class=\"caps\">The former chief executive of France Telecom and six other managers are to stand trial over a spate of suicides among their staff in the late 2000s.<\/p>\n<p>Prosecutors have long claimed they presided over a culture of harassment at the firm that led at least 19 employees to kill themselves. <\/p>\n<p>They are accused of &quot;moral harassment&quot;.<\/p>\n<p>Ex-boss Didier Lombard and his fellow defendants deny their tough restructuring measures in 2006 were to blame for the subsequent loss of life. <\/p>\n<p>The push for greater efficiency came two years after the company was privatised. Mr Lombard was trying to cut 22,000 jobs and retrain at least 10,000 workers.<\/p>\n<p>&quot;I&#039;ll get them out one way or another, through the window or through the door,&quot; Mr Didier was quoted as telling senior managers in 2007.<\/p>\n<p>Some were transferred away from their families or left behind when offices were moved, or assigned demeaning jobs.<\/p>\n<p>From 2008 onwards, at least 19 members of staff took their own lives, 12 attempted suicide and eight others suffered from depression and related illnesses.<\/p>\n<p>Among the cases documented: <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>In 2009, a woman aged 32 took her own life at work in Paris<\/li>\n<li>A woman tried to kill herself in the eastern city of Metz on learning that she was about to be transferred for the third time in a year<\/li>\n<li>A man was found dead at home, after apparently writing a letter blaming his job<\/li>\n<li>In 2011 a worker aged 57 tried to kill himself as he arrived at work near Bordeaux <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Mr Lombard has accepted the restructuring upset employees but rejected the idea that it led to people taking their own lives.<\/p>\n<p>France Telecom became Orange in 2013.<\/p>\n<p>&quot;As it has always said, Orange rejects the accusations and will make its case during the public hearing which will be scheduled in the coming months,&quot; an Orange spokesman said in response to news of the trial.<\/p>\n<p>If found guilty the defendants could face two years in prison and 30,000 euros ($35,000) in fines.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Image copyright AFPImage caption Didier Lombard denies his reforms led staff to take their own lives The former chief executive of France Telecom and six other managers are to stand<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":142169,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-142168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=142168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/142169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=142168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=142168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=142168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}