Originally from Oissy (Somme), Jean spent a week at a summer camp in Camaret-sur-mer in Brittany. On his return, he ended up revealing that three other children had hit him throughout the stay. His mother filed a complaint for “aggravated violence” on Saturday, August 31.
“When I picked Jean up from the bus, he jumped into his big sister’s arms.”recalls Cécile Lemaire. Her son went to summer camp from August 23 to 29 in the town of Camaret-sur-Mer (Finistère). A stay during which the 11-year-old boy explains that he suffered violence and harassment from three other children of the same age. When he returned, he wore sunglasses to try to hide a black eye and refused to explain to his mother what had just happened to him.
While inspecting her son’s body, Cécile discovers bruises “on his arms, his legs, his back, his stomach.” “A little girl stepped in to tell me it’s not his fault.”she explains to Liberation. In a post on Facebook, she indicates that she did not have “no explanation from the facilitators on the pretext that Jean was not in their group” and denounces the incompetence of the supervisors of the EJ’N organization, mandated by the Sommes Sud Ouest Community of Communes (CC2SO) to organize the colony comprising around a hundred children.
Jean will end up confiding in his cousins during a car ride: “I learned that he was woken up every morning by slaps, that the taps continued at noon and in the evening.”his mother explains. According to her, her son was also threatened with death: “anyway, if you talk, you’re a dead man”. While his ordeal takes place mainly in the bedroom, it continues even in the showers, which Jean describes as not being supervised. The young boy reveals that he did not wash every day to avoid abuse. “One night they put him on all fours and tried to take off his pants.”Cecile chokes. Her son explains that he managed to struggle and escape: “He hid in a bush. That night he didn’t eat and no one noticed that he wasn’t at the table.”.
An internal investigation
The child’s mother assures Liberation having asked for explanations in an email addressed to EJ’N on Thursday August 29. “I still haven’t had a response”she gets carried away this Monday, September 2. She explains that she went to her doctor and then to the emergency room on August 30, the day after her son returned, to consult two different doctors, before going to file a complaint for “aggravated violence” Saturday, August 31. His son, “psychologically scarred”started his first day at college this Monday.
That same day, EJ’N CEO Jérôme Vasseur confirmed that an internal investigation was underway within his organization and that the managers in charge of Jean were to be heard. “For now, we are looking internally. We have no explanations, because the child did not come to complain.”he explains. And he adds about the black eye: “We have photos of him sailing, where he is not marked, we are trying to find out when he received this blow”.
Also, Jérôme Vasseur expresses a certain skepticism about the fact that Jean could have skipped a meal, especially since the number of supervisors in Camaret-sur-Mer was greater than the legal requirements: “It seems almost impossible to me. If a plate is alone, you can see that someone is missing.”.
The association will communicate – in particular with the mother of the family – with “specific elements” following his investigation. Without questioning Jean’s word, the leader said he was surprised that such acts could have occurred during this colony: “The director of the stay has a lot of experience”. According to him, “There is no lack of recruitment, which does not guarantee a lack of supervision.”
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