Last month saw the conclusion of the month long trial of Jean Claude Mas – one of the biggest and most expensive trials in French history. Prosecutor Jacques Dallest called for the founder of the faulty breast implants to pay a €100,000 fine, a ban from working in medical services or from running a company and a four year prison sentence. However once the closing arguments were made a decision was taken to defer any decision until December this year.
After 18 months of scandal we will now have to wait even longer to find out the Frenchman’s fate but if the prosecution’s recommendations are taken on board and he is imprisoned for four years and fined €100,000 will this be enough? The 74 year old French man knowingly changed the material used to fill the breast implants to save money by using a material designed for industrial and agricultural use.
With his ungraceful and spiteful behaviour throughout the scandal, he went so far as to call claimants ‘money grabbers’, Mas has not done himself any favours. Therefore is it any wonder he was greeted in court with the same reaction as we would greet a Disney villain? Cue the booing and hissing.
While this marks the end of the criminal trial there is yet the matter of the civil proceedings were the plaintiff cases will be dealt with individually in their home countries. This has been a widely debated topic across the world with many finding it hard to sympathise with those involved. Despite this being a cosmetic surgery for the majority of women this indignity should not be so easily dismissed.
Whatever reason the women had to get breast implants is their business and we should not judge them for this. We should be outraged on their behalf for this abuse and humiliation to their bodies. At the most basic level they have had their money stolen from them by paying for a lie. Then there is the total disregard to the safety of the patients to think about as this was hidden from EU inspectors. Finally there is the delicate matter of this cruel and violent act done to the human body. Especially an area that is identifiable as one of only two body parts that mark a woman as a woman.
