For the 17th Chamber of the Paris Correctional Court, the article in the weekly “disconsiders the procedure initiated by Sand Van Roy and lets an increase that no tangible element would support the accusations brought against Luc Besson “.
Le Monde with AFP
Sand Van Roy, the actress who accuses Luc Besson of rape, has again condemned in defamation, Tuesday June 28 in Paris, the point and her journalist Aziz Zemouri for an article on this case dating from October 2018. Etienne Gernelle, Director of Publication of the Point, and Mr. Zemouri are sentenced to pay respectively 3,000 euros and 2,000 euros fine, as well as in solidarityly pay 3,000 euros in damages to Sand Van Roy, as well as 2 000 euros in legal fees. The criminal passage must be deleted from the site.
In this article broadcast on lepoint.fr, Mr. Zemouri said in particular that the Belgian-Néerlandaise actress would have filed in Belgium “another rape complaint which dates from several months against an unknown individual”. According to this article, Luc Besson “remembered” before the investigators “that she had told him about it. He questioned these facts of rape given that as far as he is concerned, they are false, a-t -It asserted “.
These statements of the point are “a pure invention”. “There has never been a complaint in Belgium against a stranger”, which the investigators and the Bruges prosecutor’s office had confirmed, according to M e Antoine Gitton, one of the lawyers of sand Van Roy.
For the 17th e Chamber of the Paris Criminal Court, the article of the point “disconsiders the procedure initiated by [Sand Van Roy] and leaves an increase that no tangible element would support the accusations brought against Luc Besson “. The actress indeed accuses the director of rape and sexual assault since May 2018. He benefited last May from a dismissal on appeal. The complainant made an appeal. She also filed a complaint in Belgium for rape against the filmmaker.
“victim of manipulation”
The court believes that at certain times, the journalist “seems to be done and causes” for Luc Besson in a form of “promotion of [his] defense”. On the specifically targeted passage, he “insinuated” that Sand Van Roy “files complaints for rape devoid of any foundation”, which is defamatory. Good faith of the point and Aziz Zemouri was not retained. They produced at the hearing a “snapshot taken of half a sheet” presented as “an extract from the hearing of Luc Besson” before the police.
This “screenshot does not, in view of its presentation, no convincing value, allowing it to affirm that it has not been manipulated,” said the court. In June 2021, Le Point and Mr. Zemouri had already been convicted of defamation after an article qualifying the actress of former “call girl”. The conviction was confirmed on appeal in April.
In a second file where they were also prosecuted for defamation by M me van Roy, MM. Gernelle and Zemouri were released. This time was targeted an article in December 2018 evoking his confrontation with the filmmaker. If the remarks “obviously aimed to denigrate Sand Van Roy”, they were not defamatory, according to the court.
Furthermore, on June 23, the point had to withdraw from his site an article written by Mr. Zemouri unwillingly accusing the couple of deputies LFI Raquel Garrido and Alexis Corbière of having exploited an undocumented employee. The journalist, who said he was “victim of manipulation” and “apologized”, was laid down and summoned to an interview prior to a possible dismissal.