They are more than 70 to have raped her.
Senior executive in a large company, Caroline Darian was far from imagining that the worst could happen in the privacy of her family.
At the time, she read
The Consent
of Vanessa Springora and has no idea what is happening under her own roof: her father drugs, rapes and delivers her mother to men recruited on the Net.
To discover
Presidential 2022: find here the result of the first round of the election
How did this loving father and (apparently) husband turn out to be, after more than forty years of marriage, a real executioner for his own wife?
This sordid story, Caroline Darian has made it her standard: in her book
And I stopped calling you Papa
(JC Lattès Editions), she warns about this incredible type of violence against women, “
chemical submission
”.
LE FIGARO. - How did you learn that your mother had been drugged and raped by your father? He was, at the time of the events, about sixty years old...
Caroline Darian. -
It was in November 2020. My mother called me to tell me that my father was going to be incarcerated.
Investigators had been probing his computer equipment for two months, as he had been seen at the supermarket filming under girls' skirts.
Three women had filed a complaint.
But, by exploiting his phone and his devices, they discovered something much more serious: they found pictures with, in particular, my mother, unconscious, on her bed, with different men in each image.
I learn at this time that it has been almost ten years that my father chemically submits my mother to abuse her and for others to rape her.
He had created a forum on a dating site, which he had named "
In his knowledge
".
That's where he found these men, who then went to my parents' house to rape my mother.
Could these men have been identified by the investigators?
We know that there are at least 73 of them, that they are between 22 and 71 years old and that they come from all socio-professional categories combined.
Today, not all have been imprisoned.
My father, he was indicted for, in particular, “administration of harmful substances” and “rape” with aggravating circumstance, “on spouse”.
How is your mother today?
She is an upright, dignified woman who does not want to be seen as vulnerable or fragile.
This is an example of courage for me.
The chemical submission and the rapes started in 2013. What was the tipping point? What could have triggered this passage to the act?
We don't know what the trigger was, and I don't know if we will ever find out.
An investigation is in progress, but it is true that it is destabilizing and disturbing.
My father did not reflect the image of a pervert.
I do not recognize this individual.
How would you describe your father's personality before this dark period?
I didn't have an abusive dad.
He was very present.
We were a united family.
In society, he displayed the image of an exemplary father, present, concerned about his children.
He didn't have an ounce of perversion.
The psychiatric experts who analyzed him recently say that he presents a tendency to voyeurism, but, for us, there were no warning signs.
What relationship do you have today with your father?
They are totally non-existent.
My father was quickly imprisoned and I decided not to get in touch with him.
The next I will see my father will be in an Assize court, for the trial.
You were also a victim of your father: pictures of you lying unconscious were found in some of his devices. Do you have any doubts about possible rapes?
I was a victim of chemical submission, that's for sure.
On the other hand, for the rest, I will never know the truth.
But it is certain that there is a before and an after.
Could other people in your family have been victims?
All the women in the family have been photographed.
But, luckily, we support each other with my sisters-in-law.
We all live with this feeling of betrayal.
What are the signs that could indicate that a person is under "chemical submission"?
In general, the person has recurrent absences, they do not necessarily remember what happened the day before.
For my mother, we first thought of Alzheimer's, or the onset of cancer, a problem of cardiovascular disease... This medical wandering is also due to a total ignorance of the subject by health professionals.
How did your mother react when she learned that she had been raped by her husband and a hundred other men?
It took a long time for her to realize.
Today, she avoids thinking about it because otherwise, it's unbearable: beyond the rape, it's 50 years of living together, children and several grandchildren who are implicated.
His life has completely changed, you have to be strong to hold on.
But I believe that her body had already, somewhere, become aware that she was experiencing a trauma: in eight years, she lost ten kilos.
What would you say to a person who would ask questions and who would read these lines?
I would tell this person to speak to a doctor and push the doors of a police station, to remove any doubt.
Then I would advise him to turn to the association "La Maison des femmes", which offers real psychological care with caring people who are trained to welcome this type of testimony.
I would also tell him not to feel guilty and to speak up, so that the shame changes sides.
Why did you feel this need to write and publish this story?
To break the silence around a taboo and try to remedy the misunderstanding around chemical submission.
Beyond this therapeutic path that is writing, I wanted to make the general public aware of this relatively unknown theme.
It is important to show that chemical submission is not limited to students pouring GHB into a drink at a party, it also often happens in the privacy of a family.
We are talking here about sleeping pills and anxiolytics that are at hand, in the medicine cabinet that everyone has at home.
This is why I would like a prevention campaign to be carried out by the public authorities on this subject, and for the question of the control of the delivery of certain drugs to be raised.