The Senate sets the sexual consent of minors at 13 years old

To pose

"a clear societal prohibition"

.

The Senate on Thursday unanimously adopted a bill to create a new sex crime to protect minors under 13.

According to this text by the centrist Senator Annick Billon, children under this age threshold will no longer have to justify that they were not consenting to sexual relations with an adult.

Read also: What is the legal framework for incest in France?

The text also extends the limitation period for non-reporting of sexual violence against a minor.

To better take into account the often late nature of the disclosure of these cases, the amendment provides for increasing the limitation period to ten years, from the majority of the victim, in the event of a crime and to twenty years in the event of crime.

The effect of the hashtag #metooinceste

This bill had been enriched by a committee of amendments to better suppress incest after the explosion caused by the testimony book of Camille Kouchner, La familia grande, where she accuses her stepfather, Olivier Duhamel, of having violated her twin brother, at the end of the 1980s. In the process, on social networks, the hashtag #metooinceste has already resulted in nearly 80,000 messages.

Thursday, Annick Billon stressed that her text had

"not been developed in reaction to the political and media explosion caused by Camille Kouchner's book"

but that its examination offered the legislator

"the opportunity to take a clear position"

on this topic.

Eric Dupond-Moretti responded to this question in a very cautious manner.

"The evolutions of the penal law must take into account social phenomena but must be accompanied by a successful reflection, in particular as regards the prescription"

and

"without giving in to the haste which calls for a legitimate emotion"

, moderated the Keeper of the Seals.

After warning parliamentarians against the risk of

"constitutional censorship"

, he asked about the age of 13 years used to define the criminal threshold.

"Your proposal could be perceived as a weakening of the protection of minors from 13 to 15 years old"

, noted the Minister of Justice, asking the question of the articulation of this text with the Schiappa law against sexual and gender-based violence adopted. in 2018.

Strengthen sanction measures

Finally, he announced the launch of a

"consultation work"

of associations to continue to advance on this subject with the Secretary of State for Child Protection, Adrien Taquet.

The age threshold of 13 years for the establishment of non-consent is debated among parliamentarians and is considered insufficient by a number of child protection associations which plead for setting this threshold at 15 years.

"There are a number of differences and things that have not yet been decided,"

said Eric Dupond-Moretti.

To read also: Jean-Pierre Robin: "Incest is in France the ultimate avatar of the 'ensauvagement' of society"

The debate should rebound in the coming weeks because the Senate text is the first in a series of proposals to strengthen measures punishing sexual violence against minors.

A text by PS MP Isabelle Santiago will be examined in the National Assembly on February 18.

Like the law adopted in the Senate, it aims to exclude the issue of consent to a sexual act for minors but retaining the age threshold of 15 years.

He also proposes to punish with 20 years of criminal imprisonment an incestuous sexual relationship between an adult and a minor under 18 years old.

Finally, the MP Alexandra Louis is working on a text to strengthen the prohibition of any sexual act between an adult and a minor under 15 years old.

Senator Marie-Pierre de la Gontrie said that if the government did not program the Senate text on the agenda in the National Assembly, the PS group would register it in its parliamentary niche.

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