Calling for punishment for "
abuse of notoriety
", the prosecution requested a suspended prison sentence on Wednesday against the former star columnist of Canal + Pierre Ménès, suspected of sexual assault, which he categorically contests by denouncing in particular a "set-
up
".
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The 59-year-old sports journalist, who left the encrypted channel in the summer of 2021 after a documentary on sexism aired in the newsrooms, was on trial in a separate case over three suspicions of touching in 2018 and 2021.
five hour hearing
During a hearing of more than five hours, the court first examined facts dating back to June 18, 2018, in the Nike store located on the Champs-Élysées, where Pierre Ménès went regularly.
According to a saleswoman who complained, when he arrived that day, she offered to help him choose shoes.
“
I already have 18 at home
”, “
I come for the beauty of the saleswomen
”, he would have replied, stroking her back “
up to the buttocks
”.
A second saleswoman explained that he had "
taken her hands
" by "
intertwining his fingers
", that he had "
pressed his chest to (hers)
", then pointed to her breasts, saying: "
it's huge
"
.
She further indicated that he had passed behind her "
by rubbing
"
,
"
the sex against (her) buttocks
".
Read alsoPierre Ménès accused of sexual assault: an investigation opened in Paris
Arriving in court on crutches, Pierre Ménès, who says he suffers from serious health problems, appeared at the bar seated on a chair.
He claimed not to remember
“at all”
the first saleswoman and, concerning the second, spoke of a woman who
“is almost (her) size.
She was in the basketball department and for fun I did a check like basketball players do, torso against torso.
He then invoked the geography of the Nike store, saying that he passed near her without sexual intention:
“objectively, there was no room”.
Noting the “imbalance between him
,
“
well-known personality
” and the saleswoman,
“bound by his business”,
the president questioned him: “
with hindsight, does this seem appropriate to you?
"
Today, any gesture towards a woman is inappropriate
,
"
replied Pierre Ménès
.
“
I speak to you with my experience, what I have been living for two years, so indeed my relationships with women, first I have more of them, and then they have completely changed”
.
"
Commonalisation
"
The former Canal Football Club columnist left the company on July 1, 2021, ending almost twelve years of collaboration, after a scandal linked to the broadcast of the documentary I am a journalist, I am not a
slut
.
Charges stemming from this documentary are being investigated in Nanterre for sexual assault and sexual harassment.
On Wednesday, Pierre Ménès also had to explain himself on other suspicions at halftime of the PSG-Nantes match on November 20, 2021 at the Parc des Princes.
A receptionist, who did not file a complaint, reported that she was tending to a customer when she felt her chest and stomach briefly touched.
“
Still frozen
”, she explained that she then recognized Pierre Ménès a few steps away.
"
I fell from the clouds
" then "
I immediately thought of a set up
"
,
assured the defendant.
At the time, after his negotiated departure from Canal+, "
I had bounced back
"
,
but this story, "
it was the coup de grace
".
Defense pleads for release
An assertion brushed aside by the prosecutor, who stressed that the three women, absent from the hearing and not represented by a lawyer, "have nothing to do with the medium of television and journalism" and "do
not
ask one cent".
"
We are not there simply in traits of humor (...) we are in the trivialization of behavior which is criminally reprehensible
" and which "
corresponds to a kind of abuse of notoriety, of power
" , she insisted, asking for a suspended sentence of eight months and a fine of 6,000 euros.
Read alsoPierre Ménès accused of sexual assault, his lawyer denounces “a serious attack on the presumption of innocence”
“ Colossal
”
and
“
completely out of step with reality
”
requisitions
,
protested for the defense Caroline Wassermann, castigating “
a completely empty file, with witnesses who are not there, videos which are not there, victims who are not there”
.
With her colleague Arash Derambarsh, she pleaded for the release of "
a man on the ground who has lost everything
".