Patrick Poivre d’Arvor has been facing numerous rape accusations since 2021. He has been indicted since December 2023 in one of these cases…
Since 2021, Patrick Poivre d’Arvor has been the subject of several accusations of rape and sexual violence. The case began with the complaint of author and columnist Florence Porcel in 2021, and has since been fueled by numerous testimonies and several complaints for acts of rape, sexual assault or sexual harassment. Around twenty accusations and/or complaints were recorded. In October 2024 again, a case dating back to 2005 was exhumed by the newspaper Le Mondecomplaint closed without further action at the time and rediscovered with amazement on the sidelines of recent investigations.
Numerous other accusations against Patrick Poivre d’Arvor were also dismissed, for lack of sufficient evidence or because the alleged facts were prescribed. Some victims, including Florence Porcel, were still able to relaunch the cases, by becoming a civil party. The former best-known journalist in France, indicted in December 2023, has always denied these accusations and even filed a complaint for slanderous denunciation, a complaint dismissed.
Florence Porcel, the woman behind the scandal
The PPDA affair arose from accusations by science columnist Florence Porcel, relayed by The Parisian on February 18, 2021. The writer, already at the origin of the so-called “LOL League” affair in 2019, then filed a complaint against the ex-presenter and accused PPDA of rapes and sexual assaults which took place several years earlier.
The first facts denounced by Florence Porcel date back to the end of 2004. She indicates that after a 20-hour news program where she was invited backstage, Patrick Poivre-d’Arvor took her to his office and kissed her in “inserting his hand into her panties”. They then had sexual intercourse to which the writer, then aged 21 and paralyzed, did not consent. In 2009, during another interview, the complainant assured that the ex-journalist would have forced her to perform oral sex without protection. According to her, this time she explicitly expressed her disagreement.
In October 2024, Le Monde will reveal that a complaint for rape had already been filed against PPDA and then dismissed in 2005, well before that of Florence Porcel. A complaint from another accuser, Caroline Merlet, almost 16 years before the scandal broke out, but for alleged facts which occurred a few months apart: when the first facts denounced by Florence Porcel were dated November 8 2004, those reported by Caroline Merlet date back to March 14, 2005.
A “established and serial system of predation”
The numerous accusations against PPDA have since outlined what the press has described as a “rehearsed and serial system of predation” on the part of the host. A system more crudely presented as the “plateau coup”, which would have allowed PPDA on several occasions to attract and then abuse its alleged victims. It would have all started, most of the time, with exchanges linked to the immense aura of the television star, from fan mail to contact to start a professional relationship. One of the journalist’s assistants would have specified during the investigation that PPDA, who lost her daughter Solenn, suffering from anorexic disorders in 1995, was particularly “sensitive to letters which refer to problems of anorexia or women in distress” .
The accounts of several victims then indicate that they were invited by the journalist to the set of TF1 news, to observe the high mass of television “in a corner of the studio”. After this spectacle likely to impress certain people, PPDA would have gotten into the habit of having his guests accompanied to his office, where they had to wait for him. Once the presenter was there, they would have been offered a drink, most of the time before an attack. Forced kisses, fellatio or penetration are reported, without explicit consent, or even after a clearly formulated refusal.
Some accusers were able to continue their communications with PPDA after the events, one of them even evoking a form of “Stockholm syndrome”, which makes the examination of their complaints particularly complex.
An indictment, cases closed, others still in progress
After a first classification without further action on June 25, 2021, Patrick Poivre d’Arvor was finally indicted on December 18, 2023 by the Nanterre public prosecutor’s office in the Porcel case for “rape by a person abusing the authority conferred on him its function”.
The public prosecutor again classified nineteen women’s testimonies or complaints on February 28, 2024, most of them for prescription. A judicial investigation will, however, be opened, extended to two other rapes and a sexual assault denounced by three women. These facts allegedly took place between 2007 and 2018 according to the prosecution.
Five complainants will take legal action again on July 19, 2024, through the constitution of a civil party, as the code of criminal procedure allows. Among them, journalists Hélène Devynck and Stéphanie Khayat, as well as Marie-Laure Eude-Delattre and Margot Cauquil-Gleizes.
Who are the women who accuse PPDA and how many are there?
In addition to Florence Porcel and the complainants, several women have testified against PPDA since February 2021 in several media, including The WorldMédiapart, Libération, or even Le Parisien, with several shocking headlines in november And December 2021 as well as in September 2022without necessarily filing a complaint. On April 28, 2022, several women testify against PPDA with their faces uncovered in Further investigation. On May 10, 2022, 20 of them said they were victims of the presenter in a program broadcast on Médiapart and to bear witness openly.
In total, around thirty women accused Patrick Poivre d’Arvor of sexual violence. On September 20, 2022, Cécile Delarue, journalist, told franceinfo that “90 women” testified to the group of complainants in the PPDA affair.
Initially anonymous, several accusers ended up revealing their names and faces over the months. Some women are better known than others, like Florence Porcel, the journalist Hélène Devynck or the writers Margot Cauquil-Gleizes and Bénédicte Martin. Other women, who accuse Patrick Poivre d’Arvor of sexual violence, wished to remain anonymous. One of them claims in particular to have been a minor at the time of the facts she denounces.
PPDA strongly denies the accusations
Since the first accusations appeared in the press, in February 2021, Patrick Poivre d’Arvor has stuck to his positions: he completely denies each of the facts with which he is accused. He remains presumed innocent to this day. In the Quotidien showin March 2021, PPDA assured that he would never have accepted a relationship that was not consented to by both parties. “If there was seduction or attempted seduction, it did not come from me,” he assured.
Patrick Poivre d’Arvor also filed a complaint against Florence Porcel for slanderous denunciation, “as false as it was inspired by a quest for inappropriate notoriety”. This was dismissed in June 2021 by the Nanterre public prosecutor’s office, which cited a “lack of demonstration of an intention to cause harm”.
The former star of the TF1 news also filed a complaint on April 26, 2022, a few days before a shocking report by Complément d’investigation on France 2, for slanderous denunciation against 16 other of his accusers. In its complaint, PPDA affirms that “the liberation of women’s speech unfortunately knows its share of excesses and abuses”. He believes that these women whom he would have “dismissed or ignored”, would have generated a “bitterness leading them[sant] to commit, out of belated revenge, the crime of slanderous denunciation”. On May 12, 2022, PPDA was removed from the magazine “Une Maison, un artiste”, which he had commented on for 11 years on France Télévisions.