This time, Lionel Agullo will not be able to escape his trial before the Assises de la Dordogne. The former therapist and sexologist from Périgueux, former candidate for the legislative elections in Dordogne, must be tried for rape and possession of a pornographic image of a minor from Friday November 15 and until Tuesday November 19.
Arrested in Spain after two years on the run
The man is currently in the Périgueux remand center after his spectacular arrest filmed in Spain in June 2023. Lionel Agullo was subject to a European arrest warrant, because in 2021, he had fled on the eve of his trial at the Assizes. The hearing took place without him, and he was sentenced to six years in prison following the criminal default procedure. Following his arrest in Spain, he requested, as is his right, to be retried.
All elements of the case will be exposed, as during the hearing in 2021. All the witnesses who were called to the bar at the time will also be present for this new trial. The only new element is the presence in the accused's boxLionel Agullo.
Rapes during therapeutic sessions
It was one of his former patients who accused him of rape. The young woman denounces rapes which occurred during sessions in 2007. At the time, she was 19 years old. She comes to see Lionel Agullo because of difficulties in her intimate life, because she was a victim of rape during her adolescence.
During the sessions, she says that the therapist who also practices hypnosis began to caress her, touch her private parts until she was raped between March and July 2007. The young woman, very vulnerable at this period of her life, took aware of what she suffered after talking about it to those around her. She filed a complaint in 2010at the end of its day of appeal to the defense, the JAPD.
“A fair sentence”
Today, the young woman, now 37 years old, is awaiting a court decision and a “just barely”, explains his lawyer, Me Nadège Trion, even if there could be an appeal trial and even an appeal to the Supreme Court. His client wants to testify : “She will go to the end […] It's her duty, to prevent this from happening to other young women.”. His client does not address this new trial “with cheerfulness of heart […] but she always told me that the first trial was a trial run, that it was training”.
“My client has never changed version”, assures Me Trion, unlike Lionel Agullo who has changed his version numerous times, to the point of claiming to be the victim of a political conspiracy: “I have prepared my client, what she is going to hear may be very fanciful.” The ex-sexologist's statements are eagerly awaited. He risks up to ten years in prison for the crime of rape. Lionel Agullo's lawyer, Maître Olivier Ponsot, did not wish to speak before the start of the trial.
