A former president of a French Polynesian court has been spared a trial because of the statute of limitations.
Photo: 123RF
Henri Renaud de la Faverie, who is retired and living in France, was accused of stealing historic documents and risked to be jailed for three years.
Tahiti media said the court threw out the case today because the complaint was lodged more than three years after the accused had sold the royal ordinances of Queen Pomare.
The sale happened in 2007 but a complaint wasn't lodged until 2013.
His lawyer said the former judge was given the documents by a now deceased friend whom he refuses to name.
He said once the judge had moved back to France he came across the documents and because he had no use for them he sold them to a dealer for more than $US10,000.
Mr Renaud de la Faverie, who is in his 70s, served in Papeete from the mid-1980s before becoming an advisor of the then president Gaston Flosse.
