The Court of Cassation on Wednesday rejected the appeal filed by Sophie Patterson-Spatz, who accuses Gérald Darmanin of having raped her in 2009, making definitive the dismissal rendered in favor of the Minister of the Interior in this case. After investigations closed three times and procedural disputes, Ms. Patterson-Spatz obtained the appointment of an investigating judge in 2020. Mr. Darmanin, who contests the accusations, was not indicted and the magistrate dismissed the case in his favor in 2022, confirmed on appeal the following year.
“This decision marks the end of a procedure which has lasted for seven years for facts which allegedly date back almost fifteen years,” reacted in a press release Mr. Darmanin’s lawyers, Mathias Chichportich and Pierre-Olivier Sur. “For the sixth time, justice affirms that no wrongdoing can be blamed on Mr. Gérald Darmanin,” they added. After the dismissal of the case was confirmed, the complainant lodged an appeal with the Court of Cassation. “Proof of rape must ultimately be done at the hearing, the investigation can only bring to light charges, and in this case, despite deficiencies, they exist”, had previously estimated his lawyer, Me Elodie Tuaillon- Hibon. She could not immediately be reached by AFP.
Rejection of the complainant’s appeal
During the non-public hearing before the highest judicial court on February 17, both the rapporteur and the advocate general concluded that the complainant’s appeal was rejected. “Having examined both the admissibility of the appeal and the procedural documents, the Court of Cassation notes that there is, in this case, no means likely to allow the appeal to be admitted,” the Court found in its stop. Sophie Patterson-Spatz, 52, has accused Mr. Darmanin of raping her in 2009 since spring 2017.
At the time, she contacted Mr. Darmanin, then project manager in the legal affairs department of the UMP (now LR), to obtain support in the review of a conviction in 2005 for blackmail and appeals. malicious towards a former companion. According to her, Mr. Darmanin had dangled his possible support to her during an evening in Paris via a letter to the Chancellery, and had asked for a sexual relationship in exchange. Both admit to having had sexual intercourse.
For Me Tuaillon-Hibon, it is a “surprise rape” and an “extorted” sexual relationship, “neither free nor consensual”. For his part, the Minister of the Interior had claimed during the procedure to have “given in to the charms” of an “enterprising” complainant.