She has a fragile look but a determined air. Paz de la Huerta no longer wants to be silent. “I want to free myself and maybe my story can be useful to others,” confides the Spanish-American actress. At 39, the one who notably played one of the main roles in the film Enter the Void by Gaspar Noé filed a complaint in France against his parents on June 11. She accuses her father of rape and her mother of sexual assault. “I want what I experienced to be publicly recognized, I suffered so much in my flesh, in my body,” insists Paz de la Huerta, slender silhouette and delicate features, a flowered scarf tied around her head to protect herself rain. Accusations strongly contested by those involved.
In his complaint that 20 minutes was able to consult, the actress assures that her father began to abuse her in 1989, when she was five years old. Despite the years, she swears she has clear memories of those evenings when he pushed open the door to her room to slip into bed. In the office of her lawyer, Me Anne-Claire Lejeune, the actress unravels the thread of her life like shedding a burden. The words collide, his throat sometimes tightens, but it is inexhaustible. Switching from English to French in the same sentence, she recounts a life marked by violence, catapulted into an adult world at an age where people still play with dolls. “He treated me like his girlfriend, made me drink alcohol when I was just a child,” she swears.
“My family made me look like a drug addict”
Paz de la Huerta grew up on both sides of the Atlantic, one foot in the United States where she was born, another in Spain, her father’s country. She often spent her vacations in France, in the family home in Biarritz, in the castle that her father owned in Normandy, in Doudeville, or in Paris, in a luxury hotel. It is precisely because some of the events that she says she suffered took place during her stays in France that she decided to file a complaint here. “And then, I want to live in Paris, I already have an art gallery in the Marais. It is important for me that it is judged in France so that I can live in this country in peace,” she insists.
According to her account, the last rape of which she was a victim in France (others would have taken place in Spain, according to her account) dates back to 2006, when she was 22 years old. In her complaint, she also accuses her mother of sexual assault. “Every time I tried to speak, my family made me out to be a drug addict or crazy. I don’t know how many times they had me hospitalized in a psychiatric ward,” she confides.
A complaint dismissed in Spain
Paz de la Huerta has already initiated a similar approach in Spain, in Madrid, in 2022. These are the same accusations but regarding acts committed on the other side of the Pyrenees. “These accusations are very hard for my client to live with,” insists the Spanish counsel for Paz de la Huerta’s father, Me Miguel Temboury. He has already been heard twice by the investigating judge in Spain, there is not the slightest beginning of proof. He denies all the monstrosities attributed to him. »
According to our information, the procedure was the subject of two orders for temporary dismissal, in January 2023 and February 2024. The last decision, rendered in February, is the subject of an appeal. In his reasons, the magistrate specifies in particular that the complainant “was unable to provide any proof and that her statement was inconsistent and contradictory”. “The question of evidence is the problem in 90% of cases of sexual violence, especially in the family sphere,” counters his lawyer, Me Anne-Claire Lejeune. DNA and cameras are extremely rare, but expert opinions and indirect testimonies can be decisive elements of evidence. »
Lie detector
In the French procedure, Paz de la Huerta notably attached the result of the polygraph – the lie detector – which she took in the United States as part of the Harvey Weinstein affair, of which she was one of the accusers. “During this expertise, she was also questioned about her parents and the abuse they had committed against her. The answers which call them into question are final,” specifies his counsel. In France, however, this expertise is not recognized before the courts. As is systematically the case in this type of case, a preliminary investigation was opened.