The investigations relate to “comments posted during the online campaign against him,” said the public prosecutor.
The video, initially published in December by the Luxembourg feminist media “L’effrontée” on Instagram, denounced “sexist behavior” by the host at the helm of the game show “Take it or leave it” on TF1 in the 2000s.
We can notably see Arthur kissing a candidate by surprise or saying in the ear of another: “I have always loved women who resisted me” or “The more you resist me, the more I will tame you”.
Questioned by Le Parisien, the host invoked “another era” at the end of December. “I was quite close to the candidates,” he declared, conceding that “today, we could no longer animate in the same way”.
These extracts circulated widely on social networks, sometimes leading to anti-Semitic messages against the host-producer, such as “the Jew risks nothing in France, he can get away with anything”.
He filed a complaint in December and the National Center for the Fight against Online Hate (PNLH) opened an investigation into public insults aggravated “by a discriminatory motive linked to religion”, entrusted to the Crime Suppression Brigade to the person (BRDP).
His lawyer, Jade Dousselin, denounced to the AFP “slanderous cyberharassment, organized to harm the image and security” of Arthur, Jacques Essebag, his real name.
The latter had also filed a complaint for infringement of the representation of the person by video editing.
He also filed a civil suit to ask the social network
A hearing scheduled for Wednesday on the subject was postponed until February 18.
The host also assigned the Meta group (Facebook, Instagram, etc.), according to a source close to the matter.
“Since this digital raid, he and his family have been under serious threat, his security has been reinforced,” Arthur’s entourage assured AFP.
In November 2023, the host had already mentioned a strengthening of his protection since the bloody Hamas attack in Israel on October 7.
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