At the Bordeaux police station, two policewomen file a complaint for moral harassment, against a backdrop of racism

The events took place within the “domestic violence” department. One of the complainants speaks in particular of “sexist and homophobic remarks towards female colleagues in the department”.

Repeated insults. An investigation has been opened after two complaints of moral harassment were filed by two policewomen from the Bordeaux police station against their hierarchical superior, one of whom also accuses of racist remarks, the public prosecutor’s office announced on Wednesday, July 24.

These complaints were filed “between the end of April and mid-May in the context of internal conflict within a group of investigators”Bordeaux public prosecutor Frédérique Porterie told AFP, confirming information from Release.

“Only one” of the two complainants “evokes racist remarks”she said. The two women say they suffered this harassment within the “domestic violence” department that one of the complainants had joined in September, after nearly twenty-five years of service. According to the copy of the complaint consulted by AFP, the policewoman then suffered “the harassment of his group leader”, which multiplies the “sexist and homophobic remarks towards female colleagues in the department, based on their real or supposed sexual orientation”.

The Brigadier-Chief “showed up in her office one day and yelled at her for about forty minutes with a colleague, telling them that they were ‘getting on his nerves’ and that one day ‘a colleague might [les] “to type” because they were “troublemakers”relates Maxime Cessieux, lawyer of one of the plaintiffs who “felt belittled as she had never been in her career”.

“Couscous, is the couscous ready?”, “I will vote for Marine Le Pen in the next elections”, “big whore” : the humiliating remarks and mockery would have continued in the corridors, in email loops or WhatsApp groups, as well as the acts of devaluation and exclusion. The 50-year-old policewoman, “who is tired of being sent back to their Maghreb origins” and who is “unbearable” by the atmosphere “hostile and offensive”then alerted a union representative and the hierarchy, without anything happening, according to his lawyer.

The prosecutor said she did not have “no evidence at this stage to confirm or deny the accusations”. “The investigation entrusted to the IGPN will determine whether these facts are proven or not”added the magistrate.