“I fell out of my chair, I never imagined that at that age something so serious could happen. We drop our children off at school and we are confident. » Stéphanie, Caroline*’s mother, is still stunned by what happened to her little girl last year, when she was only 7 years old. At the end of March 2023, she told them that she had suffered several rapes from one of her classmates, in a school in Pantin (Seine-Saint-Denis).
That day, after first confiding in her teacher, Caroline, very agitated and with trembling hands according to her mother’s account, explained that Rose*, who had already been invited to their home and was showing herself a little sticky, blocked her in the toilet, forcing her to take off her panties and putting her “fingers up her throat”. “It happened at least twice,” says the little girl, who had already been examined almost ten days before these revelations by a doctor who had noted “vulvar itching”, without the cause being identified.
But that evening, Caroline speaks. She also recounts the threats her attacker addressed to her and the astonishment she experienced. “She told her that everyone in her family boxed and would come and hit her if she spoke. She also explained to me that Rose’s face seemed to change when she entered the toilet, and that she had been very scared. She described all the mechanisms of rape,” says her mother.
Minimization
The doctor is consulted a second time urgently and sends a report to the public prosecutor. But on the school side, the reaction is quite different. A meeting is organized with the director, who, according to the parents, minimizes these facts. Baptiste, Caroline’s father, describes a “horrible” moment: “The tone does not at all match the events. The first thing they want to know is what time it happened, to know if it was school or recreation center related. The school director is very insistent about the timetable, telling us that it’s word against word, that these are children. We are told that we cannot separate the children, since it would be seen as a sanction when it is up to the courts to decide according to them. We are also offered to change our child’s school if we wish. » An unacceptable proposition for Caroline’s parents, since she is the victim.
However, there is a guide on the subject from the Ministry of National Education, which recommends that “the aggressor student be changed schools or educational establishments, the victim student must be able to remain in their class”. But this guide, as our survey carried out in November on sexual violence between children at school showed, seems to be very little applied. Caroline therefore remains in the same establishment as her attacker for months, before the parents end up, discouraged, by changing schools.
Caroline loses weight, has trouble sleeping
In the meantime, the school will propose, after three weeks, and after initially claiming that it cannot change anything in the situation, a strange solution: the two students will change classes, “as a measure of fairness” , we tell the parents. The change of class is imposed on Rose, while Caroline can “choose” her class. “There was a punishment side, it was a second injury for Caroline,” says her mother.
During these three weeks, Caroline’s health deteriorated. She loses weight, has trouble sleeping and, above all, doesn’t feel listened to. Since the revelations, she no longer dares to go to the bathroom at her school. And for two months, she spoke about her trauma every day to her parents, who mobilized to provide her with their support. “The evening was organized around Caroline’s need to confide and be cuddled,” reports her mother. No psychologist has been appointed by the school, in a context of shortage of school psychologists in Seine-Saint-Denis, and it is her attending physician who takes care of her every week.
Confined in the principal’s office
Changing classes does not entirely resolve the situation, as children continue to pass each other during lunch break. One day in May, Rose threw a Lego brick at his head. Another day, Caroline is argued with by a host, because Rose allegedly complained that her father was going to end up in “prison” because of her. The school principal suggests that the young victim wait for the bell in front of her office to avoid meeting the other little girl in the playground, which Caroline does, but in doing so, isolates herself from the other children.
Rose, however, admitted the facts to the juvenile brigade, according to Caroline’s parents, to whom the school transmits the information. Despite this, nothing changes. The reason for this inaction is due in particular, according to our investigation, to the way in which the texts governing the school are written. According to the standard regulations for elementary schools, a child can be expelled from a school, but for this he must have repeated the facts or committed other disorders, after their discovery by the administration. And the decree of August 16, 2023announced with great fanfare by Gabriel Attal, then Minister of Education, changed nothing, because it explicitly targets harassment and omits sexual violence, although it is just as widespread according to our survey.
For fear of legal action by parents, National Education therefore never actually imposes a change of establishment on the parents of potential attackers. In this case, Rose’s parents, whom we contacted, reject the accusations against their child, without wishing to give more details. And they never accepted the exit solution offered to them by the academic inspectorate.
Double punishment for young victims
Not feeling that their daughter was sufficiently protected, Caroline’s parents decided to change schools. “We don’t take enough into account that it is suffering. Caroline told me about it as rape, the doctor heard it that way, the police heard it that way, and yet she was never called to talk about it by the director, never at any time, they never are placed at his level to help him,” regrets his mother. Parents are poorly informed about the outcome for Rose; for example, they do not know if she has been summoned by the school or if she is being monitored. In October, the procedure launched by the doctor was also dismissed, on the grounds of “insufficient evidence” according to the court.
In all cases, the age of the perpetrator would have resulted in no further action being taken: under 10 years of age, no sanction is possible. If the children who attack are very often themselves victims who reproduce the violence that they have been subjected to, or that they have seen on screens, the double punishment imposed on the victims has deleterious consequences for the learning of boundaries. “This year, Caroline met some children from her old school, who told her: ‘Rose says that it’s because you attacked her that you changed schools,’” says her mother. The victim forced to change schools looks, to other children, like the culprit.
No protocol
Contacted, the rectorate initially refused to go into details, considering “the subject very highly sensitive” and refusing to “replenish” it, but implying two different versions of the facts. “There is a feeling of one family and a feeling of another family,” says its communications department. Later, this same service came back to us and affirmed that “the school based itself on the elements available to it as part of the police investigation which did not give any particular recommendations”. The school blames itself on the police, in short.
As for the protocol to be applied in such cases, there is none, the rectorate tells us after several back and forths. The services do have a framework, and the rectorate has communicated it to 20 minutes, but this is not an official protocol of the department but simply a contribution from an inspector. On the other hand, this document seems so vague that we can understand why it appears here as non-existent or not applied.
It is stated that “measures are possibly taken within the school to guarantee the protection of the student victim”, that he ” maybe necessary to request PsyEN [psychologue de l’Éducation nationale]the school nurse or the academic administration to help assess the situation”, that “concerning information” or a “report to the judicial authority” can be made ” depending on the severity of the situation “. In short, the margin of appreciation is such that it seems difficult for a professional to navigate. In fact, although these are acts of rape, almost none of these measures were taken, and in particular no legal report was sent by the school.
Today, Caroline continues on her path, made up of occasional relapses of crying attacks, “small panic attacks at school” and occasional anxiety. And she still doesn’t understand why she was the one who had to change schools.
* First names have been changed