One of Belgian-Dutch actress Sand Van Roy’s lawyers denounced a “simulacrum of justice” and announced an “appeal in cassation” against this decision of the investigating chamber.
The Paris Court of Appeal on Tuesday confirmed the dismissal order in favor of producer Luc Besson, accused since May 2018 of rape by actress Sand Van Roy, who immediately appealed to the Court of Cassation.
“The court confirmed my client’s innocence. A dozen procedural initiatives by Ms. Van Roy all ended in the same way. Luc Besson regrets these four lost years”said his lawyer, Me Thierry Marembert, after the deliberations.
“We are appealing immediately”, replied Me Antoine Gitton, lawyer for Ms. Sand Van Roy with Me Francis Szpiner. “It was a sordid news item and it becomes a state affair, which we will treat as such. I saw no justice there, only a sham justice of petty virtue. We promise to teach this little justice a lesson in virtue,” he launched.
Four years of proceedings
On May 18, 2018, the actress filed a complaint for rape, a few hours after a meeting in a Parisian palace, the protagonists of which gave two versions: according to Sand Van Roy, an imposed digital anal penetration then a fainting, despite his orders to stop. For Luc Besson, a consented vaginal intercourse imbued with “gentleness”.
Two months later, the actress filed a complaint for other rapes and sexual assaults committed between 2016 and 2018, episodes of a “relationship of professional influence” under threats of “retaliation on her career as an actress” with that who created the Cité du Cinéma in the north of Paris.
During the preliminary investigation, the filmmaker and the actress were confronted in December 2018, before the closing of the investigation, in February 2019, by the Paris prosecutor’s office, which considered that it had not been able to “characterize the offense denounced”.
The actress, who appears in Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets of Luc Besson, then filed a new complaint and obtained, despite a refusal from the Paris prosecutor’s office, referral to an investigating judge in October 2019.
Two years later, on December 8, another investigating magistrate issued a dismissal order, citing “the absence of any material element to support the statements” of the 34-year-old complainant. During the appeal hearing on April 19, the public prosecutor’s office requested confirmation of the dismissal. The actress also asked for the recusal of the president of the chamber of instruction, on which it was not decided immediately.
Subordination
A vision rejected by Sand Van Roy who filed a complaint against the judge for “false” and contests with his lawyers radically the content of the judicial information, according to her biased and incomplete. “Luc Besson has never been confronted with the material evidence which overwhelms him, for example the photographic report made to the medico-judicial units on the day of the events, the blows and injuries on the body of the civil party which accredits the rape recounted by this one and directly contradicts the declarations of Luc Besson”, denounced before the hearing Me Gitton. They recently paid an analysis of four doctors confirming the existence and the compatibility of his intimate wounds with his version of the facts denounced. “It’s been exactly 4 years since I made the huge mistake of believing that France will protect me when I called the police after the rape”, claimed the actress on Twitter on May 18.
The producer, 63, known for The big Bluethe Fifth element Where Leonhas consistently dismissed these accusations and referred to a mutually consensual “light and pleasant” extramarital affair. “I have never physically or morally forced a woman into anything,” he had assured in October 2019, evoking “regrets” on this relationship “when indeed there is a relationship of subordination”.
The producer is one of the French figures caught in the wave of accusations from women who claim to have been victims of rape or sexual assault in the wake of the fall of American producer Harvey Weinstein in October 2017. In court, in least three women mentioned facts ranging from “kisses on the neck” to “attempted rape”, disputed by Mr. Besson. Other women had also testified to Mediapart inappropriate gestures or sexual assaults, often prescribed, on the part of the director.
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