Live tweets of Juliette Campion.translated by computer software into English. Be mindful that the translation is poor and especially confuses pronouns when translating French to English.
Juliette Campion 9 a.m -
Hi all! We are starting the 2nd day of the trial of Joël Le Scouarnec in Vannes. The program is busy: we will hear the investigation into the personality of the accused, his three sons and his ex-wife (the hearing of the latter will take place tomorrow if the schedule is too tight). LT to follow @franceinfo.fr
The hearing is open. The president said that a television channel had broadcast images of the civil parties yesterday wearing a red court tower, meaning that they did not wish to appear in the media.
"I have indeed been able to see that the civil parties are perfectly recognizable. I have the police of the hearing and the full accreditation of the media outlet has been withdrawn," announced the president, Aude Buresi.
While there were uncertainties about the deposition of the gendarme, a pillar of the investigation, scheduled for Friday, she said that she would testify, but by video, given her state of health. "Good news," comments Joël Le Scouarnec's defense team.
I am currently in the broadcast room with most of the journalists (there are about forty of us at first sight). As yesterday, we will take turns in groups of about 10 in the main courtroom. I am in group 2: I will enter the courtroom at the next break.
The article in "Ouest-France" in which Joël Le Scouarnec's ex-wife reaffirms that she knew nothing of her husband's actions is included in the debate, at the request of a lawyer for the civil party. Here is the article in question: www.ouest-france.fr/societe/just...
INFO OUEST-FRANCE. Le Scouarnec case: the ex-wife confides in her for the first timeA few days before the trial of Joël Le Scouarnec, before the criminal court of Morbihan, in Vannes, the ex-wife of the former surgeon confides, exclusively, to Ouest-France. She repeats that she ignores the importance of ...www.ouest-france.fr
A handwritten letter from the ex-wife dating from 2010 is also submitted. In this letter she declared: "I ask you to please preserve my son, the only one who does not know his father's past". That is 7 years before her husband's arrest. rmc.bfmtv.com/actualites/p...
EXCLUSIVE RMC. The letter that contradicts the version of Joël Le Scouarnec's ex-wife, who denied being aware of itJoël Le Scouarnec admitted that he committed "heinous acts" on the first day of his trial in Vannes. This Tuesday, it is his ex-wife, Marie-France Le Scouarnec who will be heard. She has always been able to...rmc.bfmtv.com
We now hear the personality investigator, by videoconference. He met Joël Le Scouarnec at the end of 2018, at the Saintes prison, in Charente-Maritime.
During the interview, the accused "is not uncomfortable, does not show any annoyance. He always expresses himself in a short, spontaneous way, and with an adapted vocabulary. He seems calculating and shows real intelligence. He manages the interview in anticipation, like a game of chess."
Joël Le Scouarnec was born on December 3, 1950, in Paris, in the 14th arrondissement. He is the eldest of three children: he has a little sister, Annie, and an older brother, Patrick, born four years after him.
The hearing was suspended for ten minutes, the time to settle a technical problem, because the amphitheater of the civil parties did not hear the expert.
I take advantage of this break to review the organization of the trial. The lawyers are all in the main room, in the judicial court of Vannes. Journalists, civil parties and the public are in another place, a 5-minute walk away, specially set up for this trial.
It is the former law faculty of Vannes, as I explain in this article: www.francetvinfo.fr/faits-divers...
Joël Le Scouarnec trial: how Vannes is preparing to judge the former surgeon for rapes and sexual assaults on nearly 300 victimsHis trial for rape and aggravated sexual assault is expected to last four months. To prepare for these extraordinary hearings, adjustments were necessary, at an estimated cost of between 2.7 and 3 million euros.www.francetvinfo.fr
This inevitably creates a rather special atmosphere in the main courtroom, "very sanitized", as a lawyer on the side of the civil party, Romane Codou, described to me yesterday. I talk about it in my review here: www.francetvinfo.fr/faits-divers...
At the trial of Joël Le Scouarnec, justice in the face of the distress and anger of the victimsAfter three decades of impunity, the former surgeon is being tried before the criminal court of Morbihan. The trial lasted nearly four months. The victims are waiting "for the justice system to consider them", stresses the S...www.francetvinfo.fr
His colleague Maud Touitou, who followed the hearing in the amphitheater with her clients yesterday, finds that the distance creates "a protective shell" for the victims. "When Joël Le Scouarnec spoke, they were happy that it was through the screen," she told me yesterday.
The hearing has resumed. We are continuing the personality investigation. Joël Le Scouarnec says he had a happy childhood, even if his father used the flogger from time to time. There were no alcohol problems at home, he said.
He says of his mother, a building janitor, that she was a courageous woman, but resentful. His father, a cabinetmaker by training, initially wanted to enter the orders but was allegedly sexually assaulted by a priest and gave it up.
Joël Le Scouarnec's ex-wife said that her father-in-law (therefore the father of her now ex-husband) "sexually abused" one of their sons.
Joël Le Scouarnec passed his baccalaureate in Ile-de-France and then went on to study medicine. He completed his internship at the Nantes hospital and defended his thesis in 1981. He specialized in digestive surgery.
He then worked in health establishments "in Indre-et-Loire, Finistère, Morbihan and Charente-Maritime", he lists.
He assures that he had "an easy adolescence and a normal life on the family level and that he never had any problems, neither with his sister nor with his brother, and qualifies their relationship as excellent", develops the personality investigator.
He says of his wife, whom he met in 1974, that she was "the only woman in his life, having never had any romance before". Their relationship was at the beginning "all fire, all flame", he says. But over time, "their relationship deteriorated".
His ex-wife had extramarital affairs, and, with her husband's consent, she even "lived in Plescop with a new man". "Today, she refuses any contact," with Joël Le Scouarnec. "She asked for a divorce so as not to be jointly and severally liable for her legal debts," he said.
The accused claims to have a very small circle of friends. He had only one friend: Christian D. Joël Le Scouarnec says he never particularly confided in him but appreciates him enormously. The latter continued to visit him in prison.
The personality investigator met with his three sons. The second describes his father "as having always been very reserved about his life" but has "never felt his father as manipulative".
This son speaks of him as a maniac, "who listed on a document the films he downloaded and put annotations". He says of him that he is "a frank person, who loved black humor very much. He regularly had depressive moments."
His now ex-wife insists that they had a normal sexuality and that he had no particular demands. She specifies that there was a "deterioration of the couple in 1997". Joël Le Scouarnec "considered her to be the right one".
"He said that she was perfect, cooked well, took good care of the children. That was his only consideration. He was a gentle, kind, caring and very cultured husband. But he wasn't very present because of the work," details the personality investigator.
She speaks of him as an "ideal father with his sons. Intelligent, very intelligent," she insists. "Very open, tender and gentle," she adds.
The ex-wife of the accused regrets that her life has "been stitched together with lies".
She specifies that "her son was sexually abused by Joël Le Scouarnec's father". This information was brought to her attention in 2016, when her husband's sister told her that her daughter had been sexually assaulted by her grandfather.
Joël Le Scouarnec's youngest son says he had "quite distant relations" with his father because the latter was "very busy with his work". He describes a "serene" situation between his father and mother, "never in conflict".
He describes his father as "an intelligent man, a little cold, who is interested in many things". He thinks that he is however "a little calculating and has a strong personality".
Her little sister recalled a conversation with her brother where he told her that he would not want to be drawn from the electoral lists to be a juror in a trial, because "he did not want to judge others".
The personality investigator is questioned more specifically on certain points of his report by the president. He struggles to answer, searches through his notes...
The president asked him about Joël Le Scouarnec's attitude during the interview. The investigator found that he had "lacked spontaneity in all his answers".
The president asked him if he seemed "in control". The investigator nods and remembers that when he "left the prison, it was the first thought" he had in his mind.
Joël Le Scouarnec's first sketch of the day by Elisabeth de Pourquery, a legal press cartoonist for France Télévisions👇🏼
During this interview conducted in 2018, which lasted 2 hours and 30 minutes in total, Joël Le Scouarnec did not like to talk about his father, who had died shortly before. "That was the only thing that bothered him. But he talked about it anyway," says the personality investigator.
After the president's questions, it was Stéphane Kellenberger, the attorney general, who questioned the personality investigator. He asked her if Joël Le Scouarnec could have implied that he had been sexually assaulted, by his father or anyone else.
"Absolutely not," retorts the personality investigator.
Exchanges are complicated with this personality investigator, who struggles to give details of his 2018 report. We don't learn much more than his initial presentation.
A lawyer for the civil party regrets that the personality investigator did not deepen the information provided by Joël Le Scouarnec's ex-wife, who declared "with a lump in her throat" that her son had been "sexually abused" by her husband's father.
"There are, and without it being a reproach, many questions that we understand you did not ask," says Maxime Tessier, Joël Le Scouarnec's lawyer.
"At the time you are doing this investigation, did you imagine that she was going to find herself in such a case, of such a magnitude?" he asked her. "No, I had no main idea," retorts the personality investigator.
"A personality investigation is not intended to answer all questions: we send our report to the investigating judge who can fill in the gaps by questioning the accused," justifies the personality investigator.
"Would it have been possible for you to go back to detention to see him again?" asks the lawyer, who notes that the report was submitted in 2018 well before the deadline. "I'm the one who, as a general rule, doesn't go back to see people under investigation," he said by videoconference.
Joël Le Scouarnec is invited to make comments on this presentation. He gets up. "I have no comments to make. Except for one, concerning what was said about my decision not to vote. I voted once at 21 years old, so the legal age. And only once," he says.
And he adds: "I had thought about it and I decided that I did not want to risk being part of a jury member one day. I didn't want to be led to judge my fellow man."
"And it had no connection with what was going to happen much later, because at that time, I had no perversion, especially pedophile," he says.
We now hear Joël Le Scouarnec's youngest son, born in 1987. This 37-year-old electrician is dressed all in black, he wears glasses, a small beard. He speaks leaning with both hands on the lectern.
No particular reaction from his father, a few meters from him.
He says he feels "a lot of stress obviously, knowing that being from here, I know that my name will be associated with his, even if it had already been the case before". He says he feels "anger, a lot of negative emotions". "But I am open to answering all possible questions," he assures.
He has a 3 and a half year old child who does not know his grandfather.
He speaks of a "completely happy childhood" and recalls: "I even got a scooter, even though I hadn't asked for anything and he gave me funds so that I could pay my rent".
"I would like to keep this image I had of him: that of a father who was present, who educated me, we never lacked anything. We had a lot of happy moments in my childhood: simple things shared with him," he describes.
He continues: "We received a good education in the sense that they (the parents) really opened us up to a lot of things, without preconceptions. They wanted us to be interested in everything, so that we could see for ourselves what we liked, what we didn't like," he explains.
"We did a little bit of everything we wanted, but while setting a framework on what we could and could not do," he sums up.
He says he spent a few holidays with his maternal grandparents, without having "too many memories" of them. He went more to his paternal grandparents' house. "We would go to Paris from time to time to go to Disneyland," he recalls.
He thinks his brothers were "a little closer" to their father than he was. The eldest "was more interested in medicine in general," he analyzes. And the youngest, "is someone who likes to talk more, who likes to share more".
He described his family as "ordinary" during the personality investigation. "Is there a moment when your family has ceased to be an ordinary family?" the president asked him.
"I told friends about it at the time, I must have been 18 years old: I had confided that my family was taking a slightly different turn, with a separation that was underway," replies the thirty-year-old.
"Is it possible that you witnessed facts that you buried?" the president asked him. "I would say no, but it's an introspection that you have to do to get the truth," replies Joël Le Scouarnec's youngest son.
He has never consulted a psychologist. "The incarceration of a parent is in itself a traumatic event. Didn't you experience it like that?" asks Aude Buresi. "Yes, yes, but I took it upon myself and I continue to take it upon myself," he explains.
And he adds: "Several times I have thought about it, but I don't know if it is misplaced pride or modesty that has made me never go there."
"Do you think you could have suffered things from your father?" she asks him. "No, I don't think so: I don't have anything to complain about, any disorders or addictions," retorts the son of the accused.
"So I tell myself that indirectly, it was. If I had had a doubt, some of the memories, yes, I might have gone to see a psychologist or someone to help me," he adds.
This case "has taken another turn in terms of media coverage, so it's another source of stress, it's even more complicated to manage. I think that at some point, yes, I will go to see someone."
Before Joël Le Scouarnec's arrest in 2017, he remembers lending him money on several occasions. "I've always wondered how a surgeon could have money problems," says this accountant by training (recently converted to electrician).
He speaks in a rather soft, calm voice, sometimes slightly trembling, but nothing more.
"Were there dolls in your house?" the president asked him. "No, I've never seen one," he replies. The accused owned many dolls, to which he gave first names.
The president asked him why he had never been informed of his father's conviction in 2005 for possession of child pornography images. "Apart from the protection, I think it must not have been easy to say," he analyses.
"In hindsight, do you think it was a protection?" the president asked him. "No. It didn't protect us insofar as, in the end, it hurt us anyway," he says.
"If you had been told, what would have been your reaction?" the magistrate continued. "The same as in 2017: we fall from high in the end. It would have been a pretty serious emotional downfall," he said.
"I have such a distrustful look on everyone that I never leave my son alone with a person, except at school, daycare. But everyone, even in the family, I always have apprehensions," he explains.
The president asked him about the last house his father had lived in, in Jonzac. It was there that he was arrested in 2017. "It was dark, not very clean, it didn't make you want to go there," he recalls.
"I was with my former girlfriend and we had thought about it: even a bath, I wouldn't have wanted to take one," he adds.
The president questioned him about an element that appeared in the report of the psychiatric expertise: Joël Le Scouarnec had told the expert, according to his report, that his own father had forced fellatio on his son (who we are currently hearing) and vice versa.
The son discovers this. He is obviously very shocked. Difficulty in answering.
"Didn't you know about it?" the president asked him, embarrassed. "No, I wasn't aware of it. Who said that?" he asks. "Your father," retorts the magistrate.
"I didn't know about it," he says, stunned. "I don't have any memories that could indicate that this is true," he adds.
"Do you exclude him?" asks the president. "I'm falling from a height," replies Joël Le Scouarnec's youngest son. The president, taken aback, says that it may be a mistake.
The moment is appalling. Lawyers for civil parties tried to say something in the room but the president told them that they would have the floor afterwards.
The interrogation continues. Then the president asked him if he wanted to talk to his father. "I made a beautiful speech yesterday...", he articulates with a knotted voice. Like in 2020: separating the man who is being judged from the father, who has made us lack nothing," he adds, trembling.
His father takes off his glasses, folded in half in his box; He brings his hands to his eyes, seems to be crying. He then straightens up and puts his glasses back on.
The public prosecutor then questioned him and was surprised that he had not seen a psychologist. "Should we wait for a trial in 2025?" he asks. Marie Grimaud, who represents about thirty civil parties, stands up in a hurry, very annoyed.
"It's becoming indecent!" she says. And adds: "We don't have to go into judicial violence!" The president asked him to sit down.
"I thought about it many times but, when it came time to call, I never had the courage to go," says Joël Le Scouarnec's son.
The president proposes a suspension of the hearing. A lawyer for the civil parties took the microphone and said that "no document corroborates this statement" concerning the alleged fellatio imposed by the grandfather.
The hearing is suspended.
The hearing was resumed. A lawyer on the side of the civil parties wants to clarify things about the alleged reciprocal fellatio between Joël Le Scouarnec's father and his son.
During the psychiatric assessment, Joël Le Scouarnec is said to have said: "in detention, I learned from my lawyer that two of my children were assaulted by my father". He then spoke of "reciprocal fellatio".
But before the investigating judge, he "absolutely does not confirm" that he was aware of such facts.
Maxime Tessier, Joël Le Scouarnec's lawyer, pointed out that his father "collapsed" when he spoke earlier. He encourages her to speak out again.
His voice twists: "We never lacked anything, it didn't stop me from starting a family, having a wife, children, being an accomplished person, despite the weight of this case," he says, very moved.
"The man is really to be differentiated from the father. I wanted to thank my father for everything he was able to do for me," adds the youngest of Joël Le Scouarnec's sons.
"To protect myself, I don't go to see him, I try to know as little as possible to keep what is left of him, of our childhood," he concludes.
Joël Le Scouarnec lowered his head for a few moments.
After several questions from his lawyer, Joël Le Scouarnec took the floor and addressed his son. "Maybe we'll never see each other again. But I have to tell you that I love you and I ask for your forgiveness," he said. His son looks at him, nods slightly.
It is now the second son of Joël Le Scouarnec who takes the stand. I'm going to call him Thomas to avoid giving his real name and so that people recognize him. The man who presents himself as "the middle son" is 42 years old, dressed in a black sweater and a black coat. It is grey.
This job-seeking accountant evokes "a completely happy childhood". "I was well educated. A father and a mother who instilled values in me. I don't have anything to blame my family for, no abuse or anything," he added.
He had already testified at the previous trial of Joël Le Scouarnec, in Saintes, in 2020. This time, "it's not quite the same. Obviously, it's a bit impressive," he says.
"I'm a little tired: I travelled 700 km yesterday to come and testify. I even thought about getting an exemption from a psychologist, because I wasn't sure I could do it," he says, describing himself as "very close" to his mother.
He got married six months ago to a person he has known "for ten years". They have two children together, aged 6 and 4 and today is the birthday of the youngest. "I don't necessarily like being here for my son's birthday," he says.
The president addresses the rapes inflicted on her by her grandfather, Joël Le Scouarnec's father. He said he had been subjected to "exhibitions, fellatio" from her. "5 years, 9 years, 10 years," he says.
"I'll have the images all my life," he continues. The facts took place "several times, in the bedroom, at home, in the kitchen, in front of the TV, on his lap...", he lists.
"Did you confront your grandfather?" the president asked him. "Never," Thomas replies.
"You never considered filing a complaint?" she continues. "No". "Why?" "I still ask myself the question, every day. I even went to his funeral," he says.
I am suspending this LT here to write a report, for @franceinfo.fr Thank you very much for your follow-up!
Here we go again! But this is important exposure of what has happened for centuries! And it's EVERYWHERE!!! If all the perpetrators would be caught out and bring to trial, we would have this kind of court cases all year around!
True.
He recorded the crimes in his diaries. The proofs, as in the Pelicot case.