Three individuals were arrested and placed in police custody as part of the investigation into the Notre-Dame de Bétharram affair this Wednesday, February 19. They are implicated for rapes, sexual assaults and/or aggravated violence.
While the Bétharram affair has returned to the front of the stage in recent weeks, the investigation opened in February 2024 advances. Three individuals were arrested this Wednesday, February 19 by the gendarmes of the Pau research section said the prosecution. They were immediately placed in police custody for “aggravated leaders of rape, aggravated sexual assault and/or aggravated violence likely to have been committed between 1957 and 2004 within the Notre-Dame de Betharram school, located in Lestelle-Bétharram, “said the press release from the Pau public prosecutor, Rodolphe Jarry.
The police custody were three men born in 1931, in 1955 and in 1965 according to the details of the magistrate. The role played by these people within the religious institution was not specified, any more than the years during which they attended the establishment. As a reminder, according to the count transmitted by Alain Esquerre, the spokesperson for the collective of victims of Betharram, in 20 minutes112 complaints were filed against 22 adults and a minor at the time of the facts, 12 of which are still alive. These accused are ready and supervisors who officiated at Notre-Dame de Betharram. The Pau prosecution previously specified that two lay people and a priest are particularly targeted with 59, 23 and 17 complaints against them respectively. It is still impossible to know if the three custody on police are these three people.
Arrests prepared since January 2025
The PAU prosecutor’s office said that the arrests that have occurred this Wednesday, February 19, follow a calendar stopped since January 31, 2025, “date on which the investigation file was delivered, by the soldiers of the Research section, to the prosecution of Pau for legal analysis “. The arrests of the three men intervene more than a year after the opening of an investigation into the Notre-Dame de Betharram affair, itself driven by numerous deposits of complaints.
The placement in police custody of three men “is the culmination of 15 months of work and decades of waiting for the victims” for his part reacted Alain Esquerre on Bfmtv. “This is a huge release. The next step is the designation of an investigating judge,” added the spokesperson for the collective of victims of Notre-Dame de Betharram. According to him, the number of complaints filed increases: the collective received 134 in total and “it does not stop arriving”. Note that the complaints sent to the association are not all officially filed with the authorities.