Why Gérard Depardieu is indicted for “rape” and “sexual assault”

“The trouble always flies in squadrons.” Jacques Chirac's famous formula sums up quite well the last five years experienced by Gérard Depardieu, as the man many consider to be the greatest French actor collects scandals. After several accusations of rape and sexual assault - which he denies in the columns of Le Figaro - his concerts where he performs the Barabara repertoire are regularly disrupted by feminist activists who wait for him with signs and slogans. The famous actor defends himself from any criminally reprehensible behavior. While waiting for justice to decide on these famous “affairs”.

The first of them begins at the end of August 2018. Charlotte Arnould, 22, daughter of hoteliers whom Depardieu has known for a long time, accuses the actor of having raped her twice a few days earlier. The young woman wanted to become an actress. Her mother had sent her to visit Depardieu, at his home in the 6th arrondissement, to ask him for advice. This is where the famous actor allegedly raped her. The young woman returned a week later, against her mother's advice. The interview would have ended the same way.

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For his part, Depardieu does not deny sexual relations, but affirms that the young woman consented. “A woman came to my house for the first time, walking lightly, going up of her own free will into my room,” says Depardieu in his column, “she says today that she was raped there. She came back a second time. There has never been any coercion, violence or protest between us. She wanted to sing Barbara's songs at the Cirque d'Hiver with me. I told him no. She filed a complaint.” The case was first closed without further action by the Paris prosecutor's office. But the investigation was entrusted to an investigating judge, after Charlotte Arnould filed a civil suit. On December 11, 2020, Gérard Depardieu was finally indicted for “rape” and “sexual assault”.

The series continues in April 2023 in Mediapart. The online investigative media publishes the testimonies of thirteen women who accuse Depardieu of touching, obscene remarks and sexual assault on the sets of eleven films made between 2004 and 2022. Three of these women would have given their testimony to the justice without filing a complaint. Some actresses, like Sarah Brooks, spoke openly. Others preferred to remain anonymous or appear under a pseudonym.

Finally, in July, it was France Inter's turn to give voice to a woman who accused Depardieu of sexual assault on the set of a film in 2015. “At the beginning, these were heavy and vulgar remarks about the physical. He would say to me “I would really beat the shit out of you”, or even “ah you, you're as tough as a Ukrainian, I'll fuck girls like you whenever I want”. Then he made increasingly strong proposals for sexual relations, even paid ones. And there were wandering hands, on the buttocks, and in the crotch.” Later, the actor would have pulled down his pants and pinned the young woman against a wall, before she escaped from him and locked herself in a room.

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Gérard Depardieu has always denied the accusations made against him. Despite these criticisms, a good part of his audience remains loyal to him, according to the rooms in front of which he sings. Even if several performances at the end of the tour were canceled: that of June 11 in Le Havre and that of June 14 in Chambéry. Officially, the rooms were not full.