France | Justice definitively dismisses the rape charges against Luc Besson

(Paris) The rape charges brought by actress Sand Van Roy against filmmaker Luc Besson were definitively dropped by French justice on Wednesday, after five years of tense proceedings.

In this emblematic case of #metoo cinema version, the 35-year-old Belgian-Dutch actress had filed a complaint for rape in May 2018, a few hours after an appointment in a Parisian palace with the director, whose protagonists gave two radically different versions.

For Sand Van Roy, the influential filmmaker had imposed on him digital penetration, a source of fainting, despite his injunctions to stop. Two months later, the actress filed a complaint against the filmmaker for other rapes and sexual assaults committed, according to her, between 2016 and 2018, during a “relationship of professional influence” over which hovered threats of “retaliation for her acting career”.

Luc Besson, for his part, regretted having had an extra-marital relationship with the complainant in a context of “subordination”, when the actress had shot in some of his films, but twice affirmed that he did not I had “no memory” of some of the facts denounced and recounted a consented report imbued with “gentleness”.

Seized by the actress who contested the dismissal granted to the director during the investigation, the Court of Cassation rejected the appeal, ensuring that there was “no means likely to allow the admission” of this appeal , according to a decision of the highest French judicial court consulted by AFP.

“This decision confirms the dismissal in favor of Luc Besson and confirms all the decisions of the last five years which have found him not guilty”, reacted M^e Thierry Marembert, the filmmaker’s lawyer.

“It therefore puts a definitive end to this procedure initiated in 2018, during which Luc Besson was systematically cleared by all the magistrates who examined the case. As a lawyer, I welcome this exemplary procedure, which has allowed the manifestation of the truth which is that Luc Besson is innocent, ”added the council.

The plaintiff, Sand Van Roy, immediately reacted on Twitter: “the Court of Cassation has decided not to admit my appeal, which once again results in the French courts refusing to consider evidence in the file. “.

“I am continuing the proceedings in progress and I will seize the European Court of Human Rights,” she added.