According to a document revealed by BFMTV, the former Minister of Justice Elisabeth Guigou had been warned in 1998 of the alleged rape scandal in the grounds of Notre-Dame de Betharram.
The essentials:
- This Tuesday, François Bayrou assured that the socialist government in place between 1997 and 2002 had been informed of rape accusations against Father Carricart, ex-director of the Betharram institution. “There cannot be such a report without the Minister of Education being warned,” he said in the National Assembly.
- Three members of the executive are targeted: “The Minister of Justice is Elisabeth Guigou (…) who was the Minister of National Education? It was Claude Allègre. Who was the minister responsible for school education? It was Ségolène Royal, “said Prime Minister.
- According to information from BFMTV, the Minister of Justice at the time Elisabeth Guigou had indeed “been warned by the highest magistrate in Pau” of the facts alleged against Father Carricart. Three letters dating from 1998 and 2000 – that the continuous news channel has obtained – attest to this.
- The Chancellery was warned by the Attorney General in May 1998. The latter clearly mentioned “repeated sexual assaults” and “rapes”, still according to the documents revealed by BFMTV.
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6:55 pm – “scandalized”, Ségolène Royal justifies and files a complaint
“I confirm the examination of a complaint for defamation and slanderous denunciation following the unworthy attacks of a panic PM (Prime Minister, note), when he knows how much I got involved and act to fight against Sexual assaults on children and the violence they suffer. Ségolène Royal on X this Tuesday, after the accusations against him of François Bayrou before the National Assembly, assuring that the socialist government of the time had been warned of the alleged facts to Father Carricart.
“The circular that I made in 1997 with judge Hayat and the specialized gendarmes recalls the obligations of reporting, sanction and investigation. Not applied to Betharram obviously. You must now know what became children victims of Betharram Because it is never too late to repair, and make those who keep this appalling secret speak. “Scandalized by PM’s attacks, here are my instructions given in August 1997 to raise the law of silence and protect children,” she continues, always on X.
Extracts from my August 1997 circular against sexual violence on children. You will find it entirely in the pinned twit. The PM must explain to the national representation if it applied it, in particular by listening to all the children and by transmitting to the prosecutor pic.twitter.com/vc38gtwcch
– Ségolène Royal (@royalsegolene) FEBRUARY 18, 2025
6:15 pm – The Chancellery warned by phone in May 1998
By mail, the Attorney General clearly evokes “repeated sexual assaults” and “rapes” after a young man explained – in 1997 – having been the victim, about ten years earlier, in 1987 and 1988. He described more Precisely a situation: “In January 1998, still according to the victim’s version, when he had to go to the funeral of his father, X was awakened very early by Father Carricart, who led him to a bathroom, the ‘Invited to shower in the bathtub where he washed him himself, then joined him, introduced a finger in his anus, tried in vain to introduce his cock there, then forced the child to make him blowjob and ejaculate on his Face “, words relayed in the columns of BFMTV this Tuesday. Finally, the prosecutor claims to confirm “the terms” of his “telephone report of May 26, 1998”. “He therefore warned that day directly by phone the chancellery, and formalizes this information in this letter, three weeks later,” said BFMTV.
18:02 – Alleged rapes: Élisabeth Guigou Informed in 1998
According to information from BFMTV, the Minister of Justice at the Elisabeth Guigou period “had been warned by the highest magistrate in Pau” Father Carricart, former director of the Betharram institution and accused of rape. Three letters dating from 1998 and 2000 – that the continuous news channel has obtained – attest to this. In a letter dated June 15, 1998, the Attorney General of the Pau Court of Appeal written to the Keeper of the Seals to warn him of serious facts concerning Father Carricart: “The incarceration of his former director did not Missed from being noted by the media and to provoke, locally, a certain emotion.
Find out more:
“Others knew”. These words are signed by François Bayrou, this Tuesday, February 18, 2025 in the National Assembly about the controversy – which continues to swell – around the violence committed against certain students of Notre -Dame de Bétharram. In the lower room of the Parliament, the Prime Minister said that he was “never” intervened in this case, “neither near nor far” after being questioned by deputy PS Colette Capdevielle
As a reminder, the tenant of Matignon acknowledged this Saturday that he had knowledge of a complaint for violence in the 1990s, after meeting the members of the association of victims at the town hall of Pau. “When I learned in 1996 the first complaint for a slap, I had a general inspection of the establishment organized,” he said, therefore conceding that he knew this specific fact of violence.
Royal, Guigou and Assigre Targeted
This time, François Bayrou accuses certain political figures in place at the time of having been aware of certain actions in the establishment of Béarn. In the hemicycle, the latter attacked the government of the time and more particularly to three of them. “What was the government at that time? It was the socialist government from 1997 to 2002. The Minister of Justice was Élisabeth Guigou (…) who was the Minister of National Education? It was Claude Allègre. Was the minister responsible for school education? It was Ségolène Royal, “he noted. According to information from Bfmtvthe Minister of Justice of the time Elisabeth Guigou “had been warned by the highest magistrate of Pau” of the facts alleged against Father Carricart, former director of the Betharram institution and accused of rape. Three letters dating from 1998 and 2000 – that the continuous news channel has obtained – attest to this.
“I affirm before you, and you will verify it, that the Attorney General kept the Chancellery 4 times in 1998,” he said. This is why, the latter judges that the members of the executive Jospin were not “warned” of “such important report”. “There cannot be such a report without the Minister of Education being warned,” he abounds. A line shared by the current Minister of Justice, Gérald Darmanin, who came to the aid of François Bayrou: “It is not to those who were not the responsibilities that they must be asked, but to those who ‘were at the time, “he said.
However, a gendarme in charge of the investigation into Father Carricart accused of rape at the time evokes a “intervention” of François Bayrou. “The Attorney General asks to see the file, Mr. Bayrou intervened with him,” he said in the program seven to eight this Sunday, February 16. Declarations which once again forced François Bayrou to justify himself before the National Assembly on Tuesday.
To prove his innocence, the Prime Minister assured that Judge Mirande and the ex-procureur general of Pau simply could not have communicated to him in detail on the violence in Notre-Dame de Betharram because of their “absolute integrity “. “A magistrate is not entitled, under penalty of disciplinary sanctions (…) to communicate any element of the file for which he is responsible,” said the mayor of Pau on Tuesday. “If he didn’t say anything, I didn’t know anything about this affair,” he said.