These instructions follow the filing of new complaints with civil action, after a dismissal without further action due to prescription.
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New step in the legal proceedings against PPDA. Five new judicial investigations targeting the former TF1 news presenter Patrick Poivre d’Arvor have been opened for rape and aggravated rape, franceinfo learned on Wednesday July 31 from the Nanterre public prosecutor’s office, confirming information from Release This follows the filing of five complaints with civil action filed after the “classification without follow-up of complaints [initiales des plaignantes]for prescription”their lawyer, Corinne Herrmann, told francenfo. “The facts reported by these five people had been the subject of decisions of classification without further action by the Nanterre public prosecutor’s office, analyzing that they were prescribed”confirms the prosecution.
Two investigating judges were appointed on July 19 to investigate these five cases, “on which the floor [avait] requested referral to an investigating judge on July 4,” the prosecution further clarified to franceinfo.
Journalist Hélène Devynck said on X that she was one of the five complainants. She denounced in the press and in his book, Impunity (ed. Seuil, 2022), the rape she says she suffered at the presenter’s home in 1993.
I am one of the five. Three years ago, we were told that we were prescribed. That was forgetting the seriality. The prescription is not a wall. Five new instructions for rape opened against PPDA https://t.co/bzp3Vxaest
— Devynck Helen (@DevynckH) July 30, 2024
Marie-Laure Eude-Delattre, whose The complaint had triggered the opening of a second investigation into this emblematic case of #MeToo movement in France, confirms to franceinfo that she is one of the five complainants. She accuses PPDA of raping her on the sidelines of the Cannes Film Festival in May 1985 when she had 23 years. “The idea is to get around the prescription, it’s a hope. We’ll see if it’s heard because there is seriality”she explains to franceinfo. This notion of seriality is examined by the investigating judges of the first part of the case. It makes it possible to link old facts to more recent facts, committed by the same perpetrator, with the same modus operandi.
“For us, the prescriptions are a way of getting things going again. We are not doing it for ourselves, but to fight against impunity.”
Marie-Laure Eude-Delattre, complainantto franceinfo
Patrick Poivre d’Arvor was indicted on December 19, 2023 for rape following a complaint by Florence Porcel. The investigation was then extended to two rapes and one sexual assault reported by three other women. The former star presenter of TF1, who strongly denies the numerous accusations, was questioned several times as part of this preliminary investigation by investigators from the brigade for the repression of crimes against the person. An initial preliminary investigation opened after Florence Porcel’s complaint was closed without further action in June 2021, mainly because the facts reported were time-barred.