Six women accuse the former minister of sexual violence, committed between 1989 and 2001. One of them was a minor at the time and had filed a complaint.
The former television host and former Minister of Ecological Transition Nicolas Hulot is heard, Tuesday, May 24, in free hearing, by investigators from the Brigade for the Protection of Minors (BPM) in Paris on suspicion of rape and sexual assault , revealed the Paris prosecutor’s office.
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This hearing of Nicolas Hulot comes at a time when the new government is facing accusations of sexual assault against the Minister of Solidarity Damien Abad, whom the latter disputes “with the greatest firmness“. Nicolas Hulot arrived at the BPM shortly before 2:00 p.m. in a taxi with tinted windows, AFP journalists noted. The hearing ended in the afternoon, according to two sources familiar with the matter. One of them specified that it had ended around 4:45 p.m. The Paris prosecutor’s office, requested by AFP, confirmed at the start of the evening that the hearing was over. The lawyer did not respond to requests from AFP.
The former host of the famous environmental television program “Ushuaia” is “auditioned freely today“, confirmed the Paris prosecutor’s office, requested by AFP. A preliminary investigation for rape and sexual assault was opened on November 26, 2021 after the broadcast on France 2 of a report by “Correspondent“.
Six women including a minor
In this document, six women accused Nicolas Hulot of sexual violence which would have taken place between 1989 and 2001. Three of them testified to facts ranging from surprise kisses to an attempt at forced fellatio which would have been imposed on one of them. between them, minor at the time. A fourth, the environmental activist Claire Nouvian, said that she had been warned by those around her “Politicsby Nicolas Hulot before filming in 2008, so that she would avoid being alone with him.
Two other women, former host Maureen Dor and a former TF1 employee, had transmitted to “Correspondent» Written testimonies of sexual assaults. In this case, at least one complaint was filed by the woman who was a minor at the time of the facts she denounces. She was heard by the policeshortly after the opening of the preliminary investigation“, According to a source familiar with the matter. This woman, named Sylvia, told Special Envoy, with her face uncovered, that she was sexually assaulted in 1989 at the age of 16 by Nicolas Hulot, in the latter’s car, after having been invited to attend a program that he was then hosting in Paris.
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A former EELV activist, Pauline Lavaud, then reported on BFMTV that she had been excluded from Nicolas Hulot’s campaign for the party’s internal primary in 2011 because she “excited him too much“. The investigations carried out by the BPM must “determine if the facts denounced can characterize a criminal offense and if, in view of their seniority, the prescription of the public action is acquired“, had specified the prosecutor, Laure Beccuau at the time of the opening of the preliminary investigation.
“False Claims”
Anticipating the broadcast of the Special Envoy report, the former Minister of Ecology (2017-2018) had refuted the accusations the day before, November 24, 2021, on BFMTV. “Neither near nor far did I commit these acts, these assertions are false“, he assured. “I never forced anyone“, he added. He had announced that he was leavingdefinitively» public life to protect his loved ones and his Foundation from the fallout of a «lynching“. These revelations had created a shock wave among environmentalists. Matthieu Orphelin, then spokesman for the environmental candidate for the presidential Yannick Jadot, had been withdrawn because of his closeness to Nicolas Hulot.
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The former host had already been targeted by sexual assault charges in 2018, when he was still in government. The weekly Ebdo had revealed that the ex-host had been the subject in 2008 of a complaint for a rape committed in 1997, dismissed due to prescription. The complainant turned out to be Pascale Mitterrand, granddaughter of François Mitterrand. Nicolas Hulot had rejected these accusations, supported by several members of the government. The Minister of Ecological Transition resigned at the end of August 2018, citing a completely different reason: the lack of progress on the environment.
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