As the pleadings drew to a close, the presiding judge ordered the impounded gold coins to be passed before the eyes of the jury. The Gazette des Tribunaux reports that, for an instant, their metallic chime resonated through the courtroom. In his expert testimony, M. Riche described pieces whose weight, hue, and ring perfectly mimicked standard gold of full alloy; in Charenton, according to one witness, several money-changers and jewelers had at first taken them for precious metal. Thus, the counterfeit currency did not merely possess the outward appearance of gold: it counterfeited the very test long deemed the most foolproof.
The trial took place before the Seine Court of Assizes, presided over by M. Bondurand, during the session of February 11, 1874. The man seated in the dock claimed to have been born in Catalonia. The gazette’s account depicts him as robust, dark-complexioned, clad in black, and speaking correct French. He stated his name to be Adolphe Fabret Y Finet, born in Ripoll, in the province of Girona, in 1832, and residing in Valencia as a fruit forwarder and dealer in casks. The article notes, however, that his origin and identity had proved impossible to verify; these particulars must therefore be received as his own declarations, and not as an authenticated civil status.
The report opens with Fabret’s arrest at Vitry on the preceding September 9, just as he was offering M. Ballu, a notary, a rouleau of fifty twenty-franc gold pieces in exchange for banknotes; the coins were promptly recognized as spurious. The bill of indictment adds that he was in possession of forty-seven coins, bearing various effigies and fabricated from an alloy of copper and platinum. It also adverts to an earlier transaction in Charenton, after which the interrogation introduces yet another figure: the presiding judge questioned Fabret regarding a “rouleau of one thousand twenty-franc pieces.” The initial figure of fifty, the forty-seven impounded coins, and this judicial query regarding one thousand pieces remain three distinct printed figures that cannot be reconciled into a single tally.
The prosecution’s dossier posited a first uttering in Charenton. On August 2, 1873, according to the indictment cited by the journal, Fabret is said to have presented himself at the study of M. Leclerc, a notary, requesting one thousand francs in banknotes against the same sum in gold. He reportedly tendered forty-eight twenty-franc coins, which the text appraises at 860 francs, along with two twenty-franc banknotes. Yet forty-eight twenty-franc pieces amount to 960 francs, and the two banknotes bring the arithmetical total to 1,000; the printed figure of 860 francs contradicts this computation, even though the decree itself specifies an exchange of one thousand francs. Following his departure, the coins were found to be counterfeit. However, the cashier, Dupille, placed this visit on July 29, declaring that he had received a rouleau of one thousand francs in gold against two five-hundred-franc notes. The record thus preserves an unresolved discrepancy between the date alleged in the formal act and that given by the witness, offering no means of settling the variance.
At Vitry, according to the prosecution, the scenario was repeated under a different pretext. Fabret reportedly told Ballu that he wished to send banknotes by post to a merchant in Étampes. The notary, having already heard of the fraud suffered by his colleague, grew suspicious and summoned the rural constable. Fabret remained in the notary’s chambers for over an hour—a circumstance he later invoked to contend that he had never attempted to flee and genuinely believed his coins to be genuine. Ballu corroborated the duration of the stay, but explained that the traveler was kept encircled by the notary and his clerks while gendarmes were sought. The same occurrence was thus accorded two entirely contrary interpretations within the courtroom.
From the outset, the Mint Administration had invested the case with an importance far exceeding that of a simple fraudulent exchange. Its director linked these specimens to pieces originating from counterfeiting dens established in Spain, known to authorities since 1867, and harbored the hope that the arrest of an utterer would uncover the distribution channels. He cited previous investigations into platinum counterfeits and the considerable sums put into circulation. Nevertheless, the newspaper cautions that Fabret’s demeanor yielded none of the desired intelligence. The existence of Spanish workshops rests solely upon the deductions formulated by the administration; the trial record does not demonstrate that Fabret knew those responsible.
When interrogated as to his name and birthplace, Fabret maintained Ripoll, while conceding that he had initially named Agde, in the department of Hérault. He justified this initial falsehood by his fear of mistreatment should his Spanish nationality become known. The judge replied that inquiries conducted in Ripoll had yielded no trace of his birth records or his family. Fabret countered by invoking municipal registers destroyed in a fire attributed to the Carlists, maintaining that he had drawn for military conscription in that town in 1852. The newspaper records these contradictory versions without providing any independent corroboration.
The presiding judge next demanded documents concerning his family, his travels, and his commercial dealings. The report indicates that Fabret produced none. He claimed to have entered France in July on business, traversing several cities—Cette, Carcassonne, Avignon, Lyon, Mâcon, Beaune, and Dijon—spending a fortnight upon the road. Yet he could name neither an inn where he had lodged nor a merchant he had met. For Paris, he furnished the address of a furnished lodging at 169 Boulevard de l’Hôpital; investigators found no house bearing that number, and Fabret proved incapable of relocating the premises. He replied that he had been educated at a college in Bayonne and had lodged with individuals whose names he refused to disclose.
The court dwelt at length upon his explanations regarding the source of the gold. As for Vitry, Fabret asserted that he had received the coins from a merchant of Pontoise whom he had encountered in a café, never suspecting they were false; he added that he had passed two of them to a tradesman on Rue Saint-Denis. He also mentioned a wine broker met at Bercy, who was to procure casks for him and introduce him to an Étampes merchant. None of these individuals were ever identified in the journal’s account. As for Charenton, Fabret denied ever having set foot there, while the magistrate confronted him with the metallurgical analysis of the coins and the positive identifications offered by the witnesses.
These witnesses did not all describe the same stage of the event. Dupille, the cashier at Charenton, testified that the customer had handed him the gold, and that a money-changer and a jeweler had initially pronounced it good; only a jeweler from the Palais-Royal ultimately detected the fraud. Royer, who had been present in the study, affirmed that he recognized Fabret, recalling having watched him closely during the exchange and tallying of the money. Fabret retorted that this witness had been coached prior to the confrontation. Ballu, at Vitry, identified him as the man who had proffered the pieces. He also challenged the existence of the wine merchant Rousse, whom Fabret claimed to have sought along the Grande-Rue of Vitry. Finally, the account notes that the remaining witnesses corroborated the charges, without detailing their individual depositions.
The assay expert, M. Riche, determined that the coins from both Charenton and Vitry were struck from the identical copper-platinum alloy. He described an operation executed by press or balance, utilizing meticulously engraved dies, producing a metal capable of mimicking both the luster and the resonance of authentic gold. He compared this technique to earlier cases originating in Catalonia. When Fabret protested that he knew nothing of such workshops, the presiding judge retorted that Spaniards frequently appeared before the Assize Courts for counterfeiting. This judicial generalization did not in itself constitute proof of Fabret’s affiliation; the published report offers no detail capable of identifying a specific workshop or its ringleaders.
Advocate General Hémar demanded an exemplary punishment. Maître Forni, appointed ex officio, presented the defendant’s system of defense while openly declaring that he could not associate himself with it; he urged the jury to consider that Fabret could be nothing more than a subordinate agent, while those bearing greater responsibility eluded justice. Fabret subsequently reproached his counsel for having failed to mount a genuine defense. The presiding judge, however, commended the arduous duty performed by Maître Forni. The jury returned an unqualified verdict of guilty on all counts, whereupon the court condemned Fabret to forced labor for life.
The opening of the proceedings had foreshadowed the hope of wresting from the accused vital intelligence concerning the dissemination of the counterfeit coin; the closing lines of the chronicle yield neither the names of accomplices nor the location of the mint. The trial leaves behind a severe sentence, two commercial transactions whose particulars persistently conflict, and coins that had defied the initial scrutinies of seasoned tradesmen. The Gazette permits no further inquiry: it reveals the alleged emissary precisely as the prosecution pursued him, but fails to reach the illicit network the administration had sought to destroy.