After two days of closed-door debates and three hours of deliberation, the Var Assize Court found Olivier Froment guilty on Friday evening of rape of a minor under 15 by an adult. “even though there was an age difference of at least five years”.
Noting the legal recidivism of the accused, sentenced in December 2017 to four years of imprisonment, including twelve months of suspended probation, by the criminal court of Avesnes-sur-Helpe (North) for sexual assault imposed on a minor of 15 years old, the court, presided over by Nourith Reliquet, handed down a sentence of 18 years of criminal imprisonment.
At the end, Olivier Froment will have to comply with a 7-year socio-judicial monitoring period including an injunction for treatment, a ban on staying in the Var and on entering into contact with the victim. He will face three years of imprisonment in the event of non-compliance with these obligations.
On March 23, 2022, shortly after noon, Olivier Froment, 42, approached John (name has been changed)14, while he was waiting for his niece at the Jardin-Veyret bus stop in La Garde.
After forcibly kissing the teenager, who had clearly refused, he took him by the hand and led him behind a nearby bush. There, he forced the teenager to perform oral sex on him before forcing him to perform sodomy.
A “coherent” sentence for the civil party
Once his crime was accomplished, Olivier Froment took John by the hand and walked back to the bus stop.
The victim then managed to warn passers-by, then his brother-in-law, of what he had just experienced. Olivier Froment, who had a blood alcohol level of 1g/l at the time of the incident, was arrested on the scene.
If, throughout the investigation, the forty-year-old may have sought to minimize his responsibility, even claiming for a time to have responded to John’s advances, he admitted his complete guilt before the Assize Court.
“It is a coherent sentence and in line with the facts committed, estimates Me François-Xavier Kozan, civil party intervener on behalf of the Innocence en Danger association. However, I note with regret that there were failures to comply with the obligations of the probationary suspension of the accused’s 2017 sentence. We were too benevolent or lenient towards him, when these failings could have allowed the revocation of this reprieve…”
Unclaimed upon his release from detention, Olivier Froment had in fact only partially followed the obligations incumbent upon him, without provoking any other reaction than a simple reminder of these measures by the courts.
“But his progress in court and his recognition of the facts give me hope for John in a possible reconstruction, concludes M.e Kozan. He can now move on.”
