Discord at the heart of trial: Rohan Rane tried for sexual torture of foreign minors
A 29-year-old man living in Antibes is being tried in Paris for forcing 13 adolescents to self-harm via Discord. He faces life imprisonment.
Discord under scrutiny: the Rohan Rane trial opens in Paris
According to lemonde.fr, a 29-year-old Indian national, Rohan Rane, has been appearing since Monday 5 October before the specially constituted assize court of Paris on charges of sexual extortion, torture and acts of barbarity. The accused, who lived in Antibes, near Cannes, faces life imprisonment. The trial is being held in camera and is expected to last until Friday of the same week.
The 13 victims — aged 12 to 18 at the time of the facts — were in the United States, England and the Netherlands. The violence took place entirely online, on the messaging platform Discord.
Adolescents forced to self-harm live
Video footage recovered by investigators shows adolescents scarifying themselves live, on the orders of Rohan Rane and other men part of an online community. From his bedroom in Antibes, the accused ordered the victims to carve his first name and swastikas into their skin using razor blades. Some girls, aged 12, 14 or 15, even went so far as to penetrate themselves with knives.
Hippolyte Marquetty, the lawyer representing six American victims and the NGO Ecpat — a civil party in this case — explains the mechanism of manipulation: "For some of them, it begins with a meeting, then they chat, and little by little they can be led to take photos of themselves, sometimes naked, to provide information about their family, where they live. With that data, the relationship changes, he threatened them with calling the police, distributing images of them to their entire community. There is such psychological pressure that they cannot escape from this system. If the FBI had not gotten wind of this case, some of them could have been pushed to commit suicide."
An accused who says he is "guilty" and claims his ideology
At a hearing in March 2025, Rohan Rane declared himself "guilty". "I take responsibility for everything," he said. He also takes responsibility for his ideology, which he himself qualifies as misogynistic and fascist. Having come to France to study, the accused is described by investigators as fascinated by power. A written guide is attributed to him, explaining how to manipulate young girls to make them slaves.
The victims are now in their twenties. "It must still be imagined that some of them do not even know the face of their attacker, they have never seen him," emphasises Hippolyte Marquetty. Some have recovered, others remain fragile, according to their lawyer. Several were to give evidence via videoconference; one of them made the trip in person, in order, according to Marquetty, to "overturn somewhat the logic of power that was exercised at the time of the facts" and look the accused "straight in the eye".
Closed proceedings ordered at the request of American authorities
Several victims had, through their lawyer, requested that the proceedings be public. The Paris assize court ultimately ordered the proceedings to be held in camera on Monday, following a request from American authorities. In its ruling, the court specifies that the "criminal group" of which Rohan Rane is suspected of being the leader has already attempted to intimidate victims and witnesses, and has threatened American prosecutors. The presence of scenes of torture and humiliation involving minors under 15 years of age also weighed on the decision.
Discord targeted over child protection
Beyond the fate of the accused, the trial places the Discord platform at the centre of debates on the online safety of minors. The e-enfance association reports an "explosion" in France of cases of this type of violence committed on Discord. In testifying, the young women in question hope to alert the public to these digital violences and help other victims to come forward.
This case is far from an isolated one, according to those working in the child protection sector.
Source: Google News LU FR