Survey of sexual violence complaints against minors: thousand urgent cases identified
The Justice Minister revealed that 970 criminal cases involving minors were designated as priority during an assessment of the wide-ranging review ordered following the tragedy of Lyhanna. One incest case, which had languished forgotten in a police station for three years, was reactivated.
Survey of sexual violence complaints against minors: thousand urgent cases identified
Gérald Darmanin presented the conclusions to Members of Parliament of a comprehensive examination of reports of sexual assaults committed against children, triggered one month after the murder of young Lyhanna. French courts scrutinised 85,047 procedures. From this work, 970 were deemed to require urgent action.
These priority cases concern either children still in danger, or defendants already sentenced in the past and formally identified, the minister explained on social media.
The assessment revealed major system failures. In a region in the south of the country, the investigation enabled authorities to uncover an incest case that had been set aside. Two young boys, then aged five and seven, allegedly suffered inappropriate touching by a family member in 2019. Four years later, they recounted what had happened to their mother, who went to the police station to file a complaint.
Unfortunately, this report was never forwarded to the magistrates. The file stalled in the police premises without the person in question being questioned or the court being notified. It was only thanks to the recent national inventory that the public prosecutor's office discovered this buried procedure.
Further investigations revealed that this uncle had previously been punished by the courts for possession of child sexual abuse material. His name also appeared in the national register of offenders who have committed sexual offences. Apprehended shortly after this discovery, he was held in custody pending trial.
The investigation services are now attempting to establish whether other children may have been targeted during the period when the complaint lay dormant in the files.
Source: franceinfo
Source: France Info