ENTERTAINMENT

 Film Director Jacquot Charged With Raping Two Actors

Jacquot, 77, and another filmmaker, 80-year-old Jacques Doillon, were detained for questioning on Monday over alleged sexual abuse.

By Ignatius Igwe

A magistrate Wednesday charged prominent film director Benoit Jacquot for allegedly raping actors Julia Roy and Isild Le Besco, prosecutors said, in a high-profile MeToo case that has rocked France.

The charges come after a flurry of allegations against several men in the French filmmaking industry, which critics say has too long provided cover for abuse.

Jacquot, 77, and another filmmaker, 80-year-old Jacques Doillon, were detained for questioning on Monday over alleged sexual abuse of much younger actresses who starred in their films, charges both have denied.

Investigators opened a probe after Judith Godreche, 52, earlier this year filed a complaint against Jacquot for allegedly raping her during a relationship of several years that started in the 1980s, when she was 14 and he was 25 years her senior.

After two days of questioning, prosecutors did not request charges linked to Godreche’s accusations because they were past the statute of limitations, she and her lawyer said.

But they did in the case of Roy, 34, and Le Besco, 41.

Roy, who acted in four of Jacquot’s films that came out between 2016 and 2021, had accused Jacquot of sexual assault.

Le Besco had accused him of rape during a toxic relationship that began when she was a minor and he was 52.

An examining magistrate charged Jacquot with “marital rape” of Roy during a relationship in 2013, the Paris prosecutor’s office said.

They also charged him with “rape of a minor” against Le Besco between November 1, 1998, and November 21, 2000, the Paris prosecutor’s office said.

She would have been 15 at the start of this period.

 ‘Judicial cancellation’

Jacquot was also to be investigated over the alleged marital rape of Roy between 2014 and 2018 and Le Besco in 2007, the prosecutor’s office said.

judicial system.

The head of France’s top cinema institution, Dominique Boutonnat, stepped down on Friday and will serve a one-year jail term at home after he was convicted of sexually assaulting his godson in 2020.

And screen icon Gerard Depardieu, 75, is to stand trial in October over accusations of sexually assaulting two women. He was also charged in 2020 with rape two years earlier. He denies all charges.

AFP