Édouard Baer accused of sexual assault by several women in Mediapart and Cheek Magazine

SEXUAL VIOLENCE – No one is untouchable. While the MeToo of cinema has been shaking French cinema for several months, Édouard Baer is the subject of an investigation denouncing his behavior towards women. Our colleagues from Mediapart and Cheek Magazine have brought together the testimonies of several women who all accuse the actor and host of sexual assault or harassment.

Six women told our colleagues about events that occurred between 2013 and 2021, in the professional environment. None of the six women who testified filed a complaint against him, even if one of them explains having intended to file a handrail before retracting.

If their stories are different, they still have points of convergence. The women who spoke to Mediapart and Cheek Magazine were all young at the time of their meeting with Édouard Baer, ​​around their twenties, at the start of their professional careers and for some interns. All are also “Afro-descendants” as recounted in the survey published this Thursday, May 23.

Édouard Baer’s apologies

The testimonies are eloquent: behind the scenes of a theater, in the toilets of Radio France where he works as a host, in the corridors of Radio Nova or in the privacy of his office, each of the women presents Édouard Baer as a predator. They report behaviors that amount to harassment: very inappropriate comments about physique, age difference, sexual preferences, telephone harassment, but not only that. Several also mention what is comparable to sexual assault: forced kissing on the neck, surprise biting, or touching of the chest and hand on the buttocks.

Our colleagues interviewed the actor before publishing this investigation, in order to get him to react to the various testimonies. Édouard Baer did not wish to respond precisely to the various accusations made against him. However, he formulated a text of apology which the article reveals: “ It is with amazement and great sadness that I discover the testimonies that you bring to me. I do not recognize myself in the words or gestures attributed to me, but I can only express my regret that my behavior made these women uncomfortable or hurt. I didn’t have the intelligence to perceive it. I am deeply sorry. I never intentionally tried to hurt them. I apologize to them all. »

The 57-year-old actor also, however, during telephone conversations with the journalists who wrote this investigation, declared shocked that “ women are so angry with him “. On May 13, he gave a response that was convoluted to say the least to a question from Laurent Delahousse on the involvement of men in the MeToo movement. He notably highlighted the “ terrible » the climate of suspicion which would hover over men and advanced “ The fact of no longer going through the courts would mean that every word would be good to say, to respond. […] Before, the words of men were dominant. Today there is a sort of reversal before there is a rebalancing “.

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