A former surgeon is set to stand trial in France on Monday, facing charges of raping or sexually assaulting nearly 300 former patients, the majority of whom were children.
Joel Le Scouarnec, 74, is already serving a prison sentence after being convicted in 2020 for abusing four children, including two of his nieces.
The upcoming trial, expected to last four months, will address allegations that he assaulted or raped 299 patients—many while they were waking from anaesthesia or during post-operative checkups—across a dozen hospitals between 1989 and 2014.
Of the 299 victims, 256 were under 15, with the youngest just one year old and the oldest 70. The case is expected to send further shockwaves through France.
It comes just two months after Dominique Pelicot was convicted of orchestrating the repeated rape of his heavily sedated wife by dozens of strangers. His wife, Gisele Pelicot, has since divorced him and become a feminist advocate.
In Le Scouarnec’s case, he is the sole defendant accused of crimes against hundreds of victims. The trial, held in Vannes in the Brittany region, will be public, though testimony from victims who were minors at the time will take place behind closed doors.
If found guilty, Le Scouarnec faces a maximum sentence of 20 years, as French law does not permit sentences to be combined, even in cases involving multiple victims.
‘Collective Failure’
Le Scouarnec continued practising for decades despite a 2005 conviction for possessing sexually abusive images of children and concerns raised by colleagues.
In 2004, while working in Lorient, the FBI alerted French authorities that he was among hundreds in France accessing child abuse material online. A Vannes court handed him a suspended four-month sentence the following year.
By then, however, he had already transferred to Quimperlé, another town in Brittany, where he was promoted despite hospital management being aware of his conviction.
He later moved to southwestern France, where he continued working until retiring in 2017.
His alleged crimes came to light that same year when a six-year-old girl accused him of rape, leading police to discover detailed records of abuse in his diaries.
Victims and child protection advocates argue that systemic failures allowed Le Scouarnec to repeatedly commit these crimes.
Frederic Benoist, a lawyer for the advocacy group La Voix de l’Enfant (The Child’s Voice), called it a “collective failure” that he was never banned from practising.
A separate investigation is underway into these institutional failures, though no individuals or organisations have yet been formally charged.
AFP
