Actor Gerard Depardieu found guilty of sexually assaulting 2 women
NOTE: The following article contains graphic details. Please read at your own discretion.
French film star Gerard Depardieu has been found guilty of sexually assaulting two women during the filming of a movie in 2021 and will serve an 18-month suspended prison sentence.
He was also fined €29,040, and the court requested that he be registered in France’s national sex offender database.
Depardieu, 76, was convicted of groping two female employees: a 54-year-old set dresser and a 34-year-old assistant during the filming of Les Volets Verts.
The set dresser said Depardieu trapped her between his legs in a narrow corridor before grabbing hold of her hips and groping other parts of her body, including her chest. She also said he used an obscenity to ask her to touch his penis and suggested he wanted to rape her.
She told the court that the actor’s calm and cooperative attitude during the trial bore no resemblance to his behaviour at work.
The other defendant said that Depardieu groped her buttocks and breasts on three separate occasions on-set.
The case was widely viewed as a post-#MeToo movement test of how French society and its film industry would handle allegations of sexual misconduct involving high-profile individuals.
Depardieu, who has denied the accusations, did not attend the hearing in Paris. His lawyer said the actor would appeal the decision.
Following his conviction, Carine Durrieu Diebolt, the set dresser’s lawyer, said, “It is the victory of two women, but it is the victory of all the women beyond this trial.”
“Today, we hope to see the end of impunity for an artist in the world of cinema,” she continued. “I think that with this decision, we can no longer say that he is not a sexual abuser. And today, as the Cannes Film Festival opens, I’d like the film world to spare a thought for Gerard Depardieu’s victims,” she concluded.
Depardieu told the courts he has made more than 250 films throughout his illustrious career, propelling him to the pinnacle of French cinema. In 1991, he received an Oscar nomination for his performance in Cyrano de Bergerac as the eponymous lead.
In recent years, the actor has been accused of misconduct by more than 20 women, but only the sexual assault case went to court. Several other cases were dropped due to a lack of evidence or a statute of limitations.
During the four-day trial in March, Depardieu denied the accusations, saying he’s “not like that.”
Nonetheless, he acknowledged that he had used vulgar and sexualized language on the film set and that he grabbed the set dresser’s hips during an argument. He denied that his behaviour was sexual.
The court’s three-judge panel decided that Depardieu’s explanations were “unpersuasive” and “not credible” and stressed both accusers’ “constant, reiterated and substantiated declarations.”
The court also said Depardieu’s defence team employed an “aggressive” defence strategy and considered their comments in court to have caused more harm to the plaintiffs, therefore justifying higher fines.
Depardieu’s lawyer, Jérémie Assous, said he regretted that the court “considered that questioning the accusations is an additional assault,” adding that this type of defence, “even in this type of trial, is no longer accepted.”
World junior complainant finishes testimony after marathon round of questioning
The female complainant in the high-profile world junior sexual assault trial has finished her time on the stand after first taking it nearly two weeks ago.
The 27-year-old woman, whose identity is protected under a standard publication ban, has been appearing virtually inside a London, Ont., courtroom since May 2.
She began her testimony against five former members of Canada’s world junior hockey team that day and wrapped up on May 5, after which she was subject to tense cross-examination that finished Tuesday.
Crown prosecutors Wednesday followed up on any topics raised in cross-examination. Re-examination, as its known, was bogged by legal arguments that were made without the jury present; matters discussed when the jury is not present can’t be reported until after jurors are sequestered to deliberate.
Michael McLeod, Carter Hart, Alex Formenton, Dillon Dube and Callan Foote have all pleaded not guilty to charges of sexual assault stemming from what the Crown alleges was non-consensual group sex in McLeod’s room at the Delta hotel in London back in June 2018. McLeod has also pleaded not guilty to an additional charge of being a party to the offence of sexual assault.
Court has heard the team was in town for events marking its gold-medal performance at that year’s championship, and E.M. was out with friends when they met at a downtown bar on June 18. After being with McLeod and his teammates at the bar, E.M. would go on to have consensual sex with McLeod in his room in the early morning hours of June 19.
Court has heard E.M., who was 20 at the time, was in the washroom after she had sex with McLeod and came out to a group of men in the room allegedly invited for a “3 way” by McLeod in a group chat.
Throughout the marathon cross-examination, defence lawyers have suggested E.M. wasn’t as drunk as she has testified she was, wanted a “wild night” with the players, was “egging” them on to have sex with her and accused her of having a “clear agenda” at the trial.
E.M. has both pushed back against those claims, and at points outright rejected them, saying she was coaxed into staying in the room, was disrespected and was taken advantage of by the group who she said “could see I was out of my mind.”
When the jury was present Wednesday, Crown prosecutor Meagan Cunningham sought to have E.M. clarify how she knows she wouldn’t have said the things defence lawyers are suggesting she may have said in McLeod’s room.
“I had left with only one person, and that after a sexual encounter, I’m assuming I’m just staying in bed and staying there and not expecting anything else,” she told Cunningham.
“I left under one certain impression that I was leaving with him, and that would be how the night ended.”
After answering Cunningham’s questions, Superior Court Justice Maria Carroccia released E.M. Court will now hear from the next Crown witness in the case.
— with files from Sean O’Shea and The Canadian Press
Diddy trial Day 2: Ex-girlfriend Cassie Ventura testifies about ‘freak-offs’
NOTE: The following article contains disturbing details and video footage. Please read at your own discretion.
As the sex trafficking trial for Sean “Diddy” Combs enters its second day, Combs’ ex-girlfriend, Cassie Ventura, took the stand Tuesday.
Ventura is considered a star witness for the prosecution and her testimony is particularly valuable. Combs was captured on security video violently assaulting Ventura in a hotel hallway in 2016.
The video was obtained and distributed by CNN in May 2024, and showed Combs launching a brutal physical assault on Ventura in which he grabbed her by the back of the neck and threw her to the floor, before kicking her twice while she lay on the ground.
While giving testimony, Ventura became emotional at times and spoke about feeling the “disgusting” and “humiliated” by Combs’ control over her, particularly during his alleged days-long sex parties, where she says she was forced to have weekly sex with escorts while her boyfriend plied her with drugs, watched, recorded and orchestrated her behaviour.
Day 2
As an eight-month pregnant Ventura entered the court Tuesday, Combs turned in his chair to watch, reports the New York Times. She didn’t meet his gaze, looking straight ahead as she walked to the front of the room.
“There were violent arguments that would usually result in some sort of physical abuse. Dragging, different things of that nature,” she told the court, when asked by the prosecutors to describe her relationship with the rapper.
She testified that Combs would mash her head, drag her, kick her and stomp on her when she was down.
Asked how frequently Combs became violent with her, Ventura softly responded: “Too frequently.”
She was then asked about her role in Comb’s so-called “freak-offs” — the drug-fuelled, multi-day sex parties her ex allegedly orchestrated.
Ventura told the court the parties stemmed from Combs’ interest in voyeurism, and they would entail hiring an escort and “setting up this experience so that I could perform for Sean,” Ventura said.
Shown still images from the now-infamous 2016 security camera footage of Combs beating her at a Los Angeles hotel, Ventura said prior to the altercation, “We were having an encounter called a ‘freak-off’ and I was leaving there.”
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