The Unfounded Criminal Conviction of Erik Tegnér

So, now in France, it is a "hate crime" to merely investigate the invasion! Talk about bending the law to fit the narrative. This is a classic example.

From The European Conservative

By Edouard Chaplault-Maestracci

The conviction of Erik Tegnér for investigating mass immigration has sparked fears that an anti-harassment law is being repurposed to stifle press scrutiny of mass migration.

On Thursday, June 18, 2026, Erik Tegnér, founder and managing editor of the French media outlet Frontières, was convicted on a charge in relation to an investigation of mass immigration in France. 

In the February 2025 issue of our magazine, which was entitled “Migratory invasion—the culprits,” we went through an extensive and thorough investigation into the causes of mass immigration in France. Among many factors detailed in the magazine, we highlighted the role played by lawyers who specialize in immigration law.

In doing so, we exposed how defending illegal immigrants had turned into a very profitable business for these professionals. As part of the investigation, we referred to some of them and indicated in which courts they usually practice. None of these pieces of information—neither their names nor the court before which they generally plead—constitute private or secret information. Indeed, these professionals are public figures talking openly about their professional activity on their social networks or directly via the press.

Nevertheless, the court decided to sentence Erik Tegnér to a six-month conditional jail sentence and a fine totaling €30,000. This decision is in itself nonsense, as it condemns Tegnér for having revealed public facts that are already available to the public and advertised by the claimants themselves. Furthermore, should this decision form jurisprudence, it would turn into a direct threat to the freedom of the press.

Convicted for having revealed public information

Under French law, the vast majority of convicted media outlets are sanctioned for defamation (i.e., damaging the good reputation of someone by writing or making untrue statements). In this particular case, our investigation only published elements that were already available to the public. For this reason, the article could not be considered defamatory. This fact has been proven multiple times by the many defamation cases we have won before various French courts following the publication of our investigation. Any single immigration lawyer that has sued us on this basis has lost the case, without exception.

As stated by Erik Tegnér during an interview for the Journal du Dimanche: 

We have cross-examined available information with 5,500 immigration-related judgments over a two-month period. By doing so, we noticed that one of the claimants [immigration lawyer] had lodged 93 procedures during these two months. It was a pure investigation work on immigration litigation.

Unable to stand the decisions and the fact that our investigation was not defamatory, some lawyers attacked our president under another law, a law prohibiting ‘doxing’—a practice involving the collection and dissemination of personal data about someone, accompanied by malicious intent, which might lead, for instance, to harassment. This law is best known as the ‘Paty Law,’ as it was created after history teacher Samuel Paty was beheaded by an Islamist terrorist following the leak of personal information about the professor.

Again, our article only published elements that were already available to the public. In other words, none of the immigration lawyers mentioned in the article have seen their personal contact details, such as their personal address, their personal phone number, or any other element that might have been used to harass them in any way, revealed in our investigation. For this reason, our work could not be considered ‘doxing.’

However, and despite the undisputable reality detailed above, the June 18 decision ruled that our investigation constituted a case of doxing. In doing so, the court has completely twisted a law originally designed to protect people in order to make it a tool to control what the media can or cannot investigate.

A frontal threat to the freedom of the press

Not only is this ruling and its legal basis utterly contestable, but its political meaning is also a serious threat. The message could not be clearer ,as it criminalizes any investigation, dissenting opinion, or questioning of the mass immigration phenomenon.

Should this decision form jurisprudence, the courts would be able to use it to decide which field can or cannot be documented. This is a direct and highly concerning threat to the freedom of investigation, the freedom of the press, and every French citizen’s right to be honestly informed on vital aspects of our society. Should this decision be maintained and repeated in comparable cases, the judges would be able to control what French readers can purchase in kiosks and what they are allowed to read.

Perfectly aware that Frontières had not, with this investigation, leaked any personal information about the claimants and any immigration lawyer, part of the left-wing press and commentators then argued that our media made the judge’s name public. This accusation is, once again, completely fallacious and twisting the reality of facts, as this information had been disclosed by Le Monde, a left-leaning newspaper, and the AFP. As declared by Erik Tegnér: “I condemn all threats made to the judge. They cannot be justified.”

Unfairly condemned for having published public information, which is, it is worth repeating once more, pure nonsense, Frontières is now accused by the leftist herd of having unveiled the judge’s name, something that Le Monde and AFP did but that Frontières did not. 

Adding a further peculiarity to M. Tegnér’s case, the French magazine Marianne, hardly an ally of Frontières, reported that Mathieu Molard, co-editor-in-chief of StreetPress, a far-left media outlet, expressed concerns over such a decision: 

One day, the “Tegnér jurisprudence” will be used against us in a case against StreetPress.