Thierry Lacoste, the former personal lawyer of Prince Albert II, has been charged by a Monaco investigating judge with criminal conspiracy, organised bribery of a national public official, organised influence peddling and money laundering, the Principality’s public prosecutor has announced.
In a statement issued on 5th September, the Parquet Général said Lacoste had been placed in police custody on 2nd September and questioned several times by investigators from the Sûreté Publique. After two extensions of his custody, he was brought before an investigating judge on the morning of 5th September, charged and placed under judicial supervision.
Lacoste contests the allegations and remains presumed innocent. The judicial investigation is continuing.
The charges are criminal conspiracy, active bribery of a national public official as part of an organised group, passive influence peddling as part of an organised group, and money laundering.
Part of a wider investigation
The charges form part of a broader judicial investigation into active and passive influence peddling, the illegal taking of interests, active bribery of a national public official and passive bribery by a national public official – all allegedly committed as part of an organised group – as well as laundering the proceeds of an offence and criminal conspiracy.
It was in the same investigation that Didier Linotte, the former president of Monaco’s Supreme Court, the Tribunal Suprême, was charged in June 2025, as Monaco Life reported at the time.
The Esplanade des Pêcheurs
The investigation followed a complaint by Monaco property developer Patrice Pastor concerning the Esplanade des Pêcheurs, a major development planned for Port Hercule.
The project, led by Caroli Immo, did not proceed after the State withdrew from the agreement. Monaco’s Supreme Court subsequently found the State’s decision unlawful and, in 2020, ordered it to pay Caroli Immo €136.992 million plus capitalised statutory interest dating from 23rd February 2018.
Prince Albert II, acting in a personal capacity, and the Monegasque State later joined the criminal proceedings as civil parties.
‘Dossiers du Rocher’
The wider affair became public in 2021 through an anonymous website known as the Dossiers du Rocher, which accused four former figures close to Prince Albert II – including Lacoste and Linotte – of collusion.
Linotte became the first of those figures to be charged by the Monegasque authorities when he was placed under formal investigation in June 2025 for offences including organised unlawful taking of interests and passive bribery.
Reaction
According to the French news agency AFP, the Prince’s lawyer, Cyril Bonan, said those who had taken part in the alleged conduct — and against whom the courts considered there to be serious and corroborating evidence — would have to answer for their actions and could no longer pass themselves off as victims.
Lacoste’s lawyers, in a statement reported by AFP, called the indictment shameful, dismissing what they described as a jumble of unfounded accusations and arguing that the Monegasque justice system had, since 2023, been used to serve the powerful.
Meanwhile Pastor’s lawyers, Antoine Vey and Richard Malka, said the criminal charges confirmed the seriousness of the conduct their client had denounced for years, AFP reported.
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Photo by Monaco Life