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Galliano faces trial, Dior keeps the show going

(Agencies)
2011-03-03 15:05

British fashion designer John Galliano will stand trial on charges of making racist insults in public, allegations which cost him his job at Christian Dior and prompted him to apologize on Wednesday.

Dior is going ahead with its Paris Fashion Week show on Friday after firing Galliano for his "odious" behavior on a widely viewed video showing the former chief designer expressing admiration for Adolf Hitler.

French prosecutors said on Wednesday they had charged Galliano with making racist comments to three people, an offence that carries a sentence of up to six months in prison and a 22,500-euro ($31,240) fine.

The charges relate to two separate incidents, one on Thursday and the first in October.

The fallen star, who has worked for Dior since 1996, said in a statement anti-Semitism and racism "have no part in our society" and "unreservedly" apologized for causing any offence.

The video surfaced after accusations were made public and raced across the Internet. It shows Galliano in a bar wearing a grey hat and slurring anti-Semitic insults into the camera.

Galliano's lawyer said during a television interview on Wednesday his client was not standing trial for the video.

"This video, nobody knows under which conditions it was made, if Mr Galliano was provoked or insulted before, nobody knows the context," Stephane Zerbib said in an interview on France's Canal Plus channel.

"We see a man who is alone, who is a victim of his demons, for which he is getting treatment... who obviously mixed alcohol and medication."

The lawyer declined to say if Galliano had left France.

Several media reports on Wednesday said he had flown out to a rehabilitation center.

"He will say it in front of the court that he's not a racist, that he's not anti-Semitic, that he fights all forms of intolerance. He will repeat it every time he needs to," Zerbib told Reuters TV.

It is uncertain when the video was taken, but Thursday's incident involved a couple, who complained Galliano had verbally abused them with racist and anti-Semitic comments at La Perle bar in Paris's hip Marais district.

The designer said a number of witnesses at the bar told police "he was subjected to verbal harassment and an unprovoked assault when an individual tried to hit me with a chair having taken violent exception to my look and my clothing."

"For these reasons I have commenced proceedings for defamation and the threats made against me," Galliano said in his statement on Wednesday.