French actor, Gerard Depardieu Charged with Rape in Revived Case
The Paris prosecutor’s office says French actor Gerard Depardieu was charged in December with rape and sexual assault after authorities revived a 2018 investigation that was initially dropped. https://t.co/1TFcvFXcHk
- NBC News (@NBCNews) February 24, 2021
- The Paris prosecutor’s office said on Tuesday that French actor Gerard Depardieu was charged in December with rape and sexual assault after authorities had revived a 2018 investigation that had been initially dropped.
- The prosecutor’s office addressed the charges after the case was leaked to French media.
- French media reports said the charges relate to allegations made by an actress in her 20s that date to 2018. An initial inquiry against the star was dropped in 2019 because of lack of evidence but was later revived.
- Newspaper Le Parisien and broadcaster BFM TV said the woman alleged that Depardieu assaulted her on Aug. 7 and Aug. 13, 2018 at his home in Paris. The two met when Depardieu led a master class at her school.
- The actress, who has not been named, first filed a complaint with details of alleged rape and assault in August 2018 in the southern French city of Aix-en-Provence. The probe was taken over by Paris investigators, but was soon dropped.
- Depardieu’s lawyer Hervé Temime was not immediately available for comment, but he has previously said that the actor “absolutely denies any rape, any sexual assault, any crime.”.
- In 2014, Depardieu played the leading role in “Welcome to New York,” the film inspired by the life of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former director of the International Monetary Fund who was accused in 2011 of sexually assaulting a hotel maid.
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