Three ex-companions of Julien Bayou spoke at length in Reporterre to describe the “psychological violence” of which they accuse the deputy EELV. A highlighting of the behavior of the chosen one, however defended by other women.
In just over a month, members of the Europe Ecologie – Les Verts party will be called upon to appoint the new national secretary for political training. A ballot organized on December 10 following the outbreak of the Bayou affair, named after the deputy for Paris Julien Bayou, boss of EELV, accused of psychological violence by several women. If the latter have remained silent since the file was made public in mid-September, they decided to speak in the press and deliver their version of the facts, Tuesday, October 25, 2022.
While the respondent responded to the attacks in an interview given to World then on the set of It’s up to you (France 5), the accusers delivered their version of the facts to Reporterre, a medium centered around ecology. This long story allows us to see more clearly on the facts alleged against Julien Bayou. If, on reading the article, nothing appears to be criminally reprehensible, the moral behavior of the elected official and his attitude towards his various companions raise questions, far from the image of defending women that seeks to give itself EELV. However, no physical or sexual violence is described.
A companion described as “repressed goudoue”
The origin of the case dates back to 2015. In the fall of that year, Julien Bayou got into a relationship with a woman, renowned Joan by Reporterre. With her, the one who is now a deputy has an intriguing attitude, if we are to believe the facts reported: on the one hand, he tells her he wants to start a family with her when, on the other, he confides to another woman that he doesn’t like her and doesn’t want to make a living with her, even calling her a “repressed (lesbian, editor’s note) goudoue.” The two maintain a relationship between private and professional life, Jeanne particularly helping Julien Bayou and the party on legal matters. And this, even though the now ex-national secretary of the party maintains a relationship with another woman, started in November 2017, and discovered by Jeanne.
This woman, Clear, is part of the campaign team for the 2017 legislative elections, “a kind of permanent psychological torture for me” explains Jeanne. The relationship did not finally end until the summer of 2018. “Leaving him, I was afraid of becoming an outcast in the Greens, of being blacklisted. I had to choose between continuing to suffer this emotional pain or losing everything for which I had worked for the last years spent in his shadow writing the appeals and supporting his campaigns.” She then went into depression.
From “seduction professional” to “serial deceiver”
Claire, the woman with whom he cheated on Jeanne, Julien Bayou also met her in 2015. But according to the main interested party, their relationship only started in November 2017, lasting until April 2019. She describes a relationship between romanticism and disappointments. “For him, women are objects to be possessed, whether for sex or for work. Sometimes both at the same time”, she explains. Claire was a volunteer at EELV. It is in this context that the link was created, after a flirt initiated by the chosen one during an evening, under the eyes of his companion at the time, Jeanne. “I fell into his nets as a professional guy in seduction with a well-rehearsed feminist and progressive discourse, a serial deceiver, a manipulator who uses women as sexual objects and comforters: we reassure his ego, we listen to him, we the hug”, says Claire.
A “psychological torture” for an ex-companion
During their relationship, which began even when Julien Bayou was in a relationship, the thirty-year-old also dated a new woman, named Agathe. The two met in 2016 and began to see each other in 2017. After weeks of “emotional lifts” between romance and silence for weeks, he finally presented her as “his darling” in September 2018, after the end of his relationship with Jeanne… but while he is still dating Claire.
Without committing the slightest physical or sexual violence – no more than on the two other women mentioned above – Julien Bayou is however described as having a psychological hold, playing with the memory of his spouse, without empathy and with a versatile behavior with many contradictions. A “psychological torture” supported by the discovery of other relationships he had – “five to ten” according to him, without always protecting himself -, and the presence, in the campaign school for the Regionals of 2021, of a man whom Agathe accuses of having raped her. Unbearable for the young woman, especially since Julien Bayou refuses to dismiss the said person.
Julien Bayou finally ends the relationship at the end of November 2021… by a message on Whatsapp, even though his now ex had just had a miscarriage, which she had not informed him of (she informed him later ). Agathe explains that she emerged psychologically destroyed from this relationship, her psychologist stating that “in very strong moments of anxiety, she hurt herself by hitting her head.” Reporterre also adds that the young woman made two suicide attempts in April and June 2022.
Julien Bayou defended by other women
The investigation of Reporterre also made it possible to collect several testimonies from women who, for their part, refute the accusations of control brought against Julien Bayou, evoking rather cowardice. “He can’t stand being alone and goes from conquest to conquest. In a stable relationship, as soon as he has a little problem, instead of facing it, he goes elsewhere. But for me, it doesn’t is not psychological violence”, explains one of them. If Julien Bayou has not answered the questions of Reporterrehis behavior is explained by the women questioned by the “fear of abandonment following the death of his mother.”