Facts
The DFC was seized of a nullity appeal filed by X. against a judgment of the Economic Criminal Court of the Canton of Berne which had found him guilty of forgery in titles on several occasions. The facts are as follows: A. C. and B. C. had granted a loan to the sole proprietorship D. which was mainly used for the purchase of a property for the spouses C. in Paraguay. As D. could not repay the remaining balance, the lenders agreed to take over all the shares of the company E. AG, which were significantly more valuable, for CHF 50,000.-. X. then drew up a sales contract and a repurchase agreement between D. and the spouses C., dated retroactively to 14 March 1994, for the auditor of the sole proprietorship D. This backdating was intended to separate E. AG from the assets of D., which was threatened with bankruptcy due to its illiquidity and insolvency that had occurred in the course of 1994, as well as to prevent any challenge to the sale. Furthermore, according to a loan agreement dated 28 March 1988, the company D. AG and the company E. AG had agreed that an interest-bearing loan of CHF 50,000.- per year was to be or had been paid by 31 December 1987. In the balance sheet of D. AG as of 31 December 1994, this loan appeared with a zero balance. In the summer of 1995, X. prepared a draft contract between D. AG as the assignor and D. as the assignee, under which D. AG assigned its claim of CHF 635,000.- against E. AG "for the purpose of offsetting mutual claims between M. D. and D. AG". This contract was signed by the parties at an apparently unspecified date in the course of the summer of 1995 and backdated by X. to 14 January 1994.Considerations
1. The DFC recalls that commercial accounting has the character of a title even in the absence of a legal obligation to keep accounts. Anyone who backdates documents intended for commercial accounting commits intellectual forgery in the titles merely…