Found guilty of sexual assault and rape on patients, Bassam El-Absi, a 72-year-old former radiologist, must appear on appeal at the Angoulême court (Charente) this Friday, November 29. The man was sentenced to 17 years in prison in February 2023 before appealing his conviction.
A year and a half after his conviction by the courts, Bassam El-Absi, a former radiologist from Langon, will be back in court this Friday, November 29. Indeed, the man is accused of sexual assault and rape by several patients. In this case, the defendant had already been sentenced to 17 years in prison in February 2023 by the Bordeaux Assize Court.
At the time, the prosecution had requested 15 years of criminal imprisonment against him. He then appealed his conviction. The case is therefore back from this Friday, November 29 and until next Friday, December 6 before the Angoulême court (Charente).
Bassam El-Absi considered that the verdict, pronounced by the Assize Court of Bordeaux in February 2023, was “unjust”, deploring a decision “in line with this entire procedure, where everything was done to achieve a guilt which was the conviction of the jurors from the start”. “There was no room for maneuver to raise doubts,” according to Me Pierre, one of his lawyers.
A year and a half ago, the victims were heard during the trial, describing specific facts ranging from touching of private parts to digital penetration. The victims are eight women: former patients but also a medical secretary and a young girl aged 15 at the time of the events.
“He ruined my life”
A 31-year-old complainant explained to the court that she had not had a “sentimental life” for six years because of the accused, affirming that he had “ruined” her life, and that she did not know if it would happen. to one day trust a man. In 2016, during an appointment for an ultrasound with the doctor, this complainant said she had undergone massages on her private parts. “The feeling of shame still exists,” she said.
Her complaint, filed the same day, and that of another patient had triggered legal proceedings against the practitioner. Other testimonies had supported the complaints filed between 2016 and 2019. “This is a particularly trying procedure for my client,” estimates Maître Hamon, the lawyer for one of the complainants, who recalls that the victims will have to finding themselves “again facing the accused”. “She remains hopeful that he will recognize the facts, it is important for his reconstruction,” she added.
Another victim, interviewed by Sud-Ouest, said that the accused “put his fingers in my vagina and anus without wearing gloves, rubbed my clitoris”. “I was petrified. He explained to me with a smile where my G-spot was. I had a lot of pain because of the back and forth of his probe. I came home, I was bleeding. I thought I lost my baby,” she said.
The ex-radiologist had also been accused by a former secretary of touching in his workplace, like other colleagues who did not file a complaint. Following these accusations, Bassam El-Absi was removed from the Order of Physicians in 2019.
