Two investigating judges have decided to close the judicial investigation targeting comedian Ary Abittan. MARTIN BUREAU / AFP
After granting him the more favorable status of assisted witness, two Parisian investigating judges closed the rape investigation targeting the actor.
Two Parisian investigating judges closed the rape investigation on Thursday against actor Ary Abittan, AFP learned on Friday from a source familiar with the matter. The 49-year-old actor, notably known for playing in comedy What the hell have we done?had been indicted for rape in November 2021 by an investigating judge.
He is accused by a young woman, then 23 years old, whom he had been dating for two months at the time of the facts, of having imposed sodomy on him during a sexual encounter at his home in October 2021.
But a reversal in the procedure: on Wednesday, two magistrates granted him the more favorable status of assisted witness, in accordance with the requisitions of the prosecution. These investigating judges considered that new elements, collected after the indictment of the actor, were “likely to weaken the probative value of the indices initially retained”according to elements of the order of which AFP was aware.
If the magistrates recognized post-traumatic stress “indisputable” of the young woman after the fact, they do not consider “not possible to conclude that the traumatic lesions and bleeding” of the complainant “result from an act of non-consensual sexual penetration” because the two recounted having had a consensual first report, and that the bleeding “predated, at least in part, the second disputed report”.
They also cited testimonies from former girlfriends of Ary Abittan who describe him as “a respectful sexual partner”as well as psychiatric and psychological expert opinions which have not “record of personality elements in favor of deviant sexuality or aggressive sexual impulses”.
During the investigation, the woman described the actor as “obsessed” by the practice of sodomy but specified that he had, until then, always accepted his refusal. That night, she claims to have first said “not tonight”Then “screamed in pain” during the act.
Contacted on Wednesday, the complainant’s lawyer, Me Arash Derambarsh, did not wish to speak. “to preserve the secrecy of the instruction”. Thursday, after in particular several press articles echoing the change in status of the actor, he filed a complaint with the Paris prosecutor’s office for violation of the secrecy of the instruction and the investigation.