Keystone-SDA
The Paris Court of Appeal will deliver its decision on March 6 on requests made by French actor Gérard Depardieu, who on Thursday contested elements of the investigation targeting him for rape, AFP learned from a judicial source.
This content was published on
January 16, 2025 – 10:48 p.m.
(Keystone-ATS) Gérard Depardieu, against whom the prosecution requested a trial for rape and sexual assault on actress Charlotte Arnould, has been indicted since August 2018.
At the time of the alleged facts, he was 69 years old, she was 19.
The actor vigorously denies it. In March 2022, the court of appeal confirmed his indictment, which he requested to be annulled.
On Thursday, the investigating chamber examined two new appeals for almost four hours.
The first requested the nullity of a testimony from an extra, collected by the investigation site Mediapart then by e-mail by the investigators, the woman living abroad, according to a source close to the case.
In December 2014, during a scene from the filming of “Big House”, directed by Jean-Emmanuel Godart, “without warning, Gérard Depardieu put his hand under my dress”, she told Mediapart.
“He tried to pull aside my panties and finger me (…). If I had not stopped him, he would have succeeded,” she assured.
Other requests concern a report from the television program “Complément d’investigation”, the subject of heated controversy in December 2023.
“A fraudulent setup”
In this program, we see Gérard Depardieu, on a trip to North Korea in 2018, multiplying misogynistic remarks and uttering others of a sexual nature when a little girl on a horse comes into the image. “If he ever gallops, she enjoys,” he says in particular.
A fraudulent setup for his defense, which went to civil justice.
According to two sources close to the case, Mr. Depardieu also ordered the magistrate responsible for investigating the rapes of Charlotte Arnould to add to the proceedings or seize these rushes to decide, among other things, on the authenticity of the montage.
The judge refused at the end of July, according to another source close to the case. If she had asked France Télévisions and the production company Hikari to communicate the rushes, she explained that she could not force them to do so, because she is only responsible for investigating accusations of rape. Mr. Depardieu appealed.
His defense also believes that the investigating judge showed “bias regarding the reporting carried out in North Korea”, particularly “in the hearing of different people”, said one of the close sources.
The actor must also appear at the end of March for sexual assault in September 2021 during the filming of “Green Shutters”. He disputes the facts.
Related News :