French pop icon Patrick Bruel was charged with rape and sexual assault on Wednesday, after practically two dozen girls got here ahead to make allegations in opposition to him, some relationship again to the Nineties.
The 67-year-old, a serious determine in French well-liked tradition with a number of high‑promoting albums and dozens of movie appearances, has denied any wrongdoing.
He is the most recent high French celeb to face investigators within the wake of the #MeToo motion, after movie legend Gerard Depardieu was handed a suspended 18-month jail sentence final yr for sexually assaulting two girls on a movie set.
Bruel, a heartthrob whose face was plastered on teen magazines within the early Nineties, has spent 48 hours in custody after being held for questioning on Monday.
A choose within the Paris suburb of Nanterre mentioned Bruel was charged with rape, tried rape, sexual assault and sexual harassment.
Earlier the Nanterre prosecutor’s workplace mentioned the costs associated to 9 victims and concerned incidents between 2010 and 2019.
It mentioned that the complaints of one other 13 folks accusing him of rape, tried rape, sexual assault and sexual harassment from 1992 to 2008 had been added to the file handed over to investigating magistrates, even when they “appeared to be beyond the statute of limitations at this stage”.
Prosecutors have requested for Bruel to be put in pre-trial detention.
Bruel — who in 1998 was briefly a world poker champion — protested his innocence final month, saying in an Instagram publish that he had “never forced a woman”.
He then mentioned he could be cancelling all concert events till September.
His attorneys on Monday mentioned in a press release he would reply all questions and “provide all the elements necessary to demonstrate his innocence”.
Bruel’s accusers embody Daniela Elstner, the present director of Unifrance, an organization selling French cinema overseas.
In March, she formally accused him of tried rape throughout a movie pageant in Mexico when she was a 26-year-old intern at Unifrance in 1997.
“This is a real first legal victory for the victims,” her lawyer Jade Dousselin informed AFP after the prosecutors demanded prices.
Several new allegations in opposition to the star have been reported since Monday.
Lawyer Myriam Guedj Benayoun on Tuesday mentioned a brand new grievance would quickly be filed in opposition to the singer for the alleged tried rape of a 19-year-old at his dwelling in 2000.
Another lawyer, Corinne Herrmann, has mentioned two girls filed rape complaints in opposition to him on May 27 and June 3.
Investigative news outlet Mediapart mentioned the ladies have been a former magnificence queen who accuses Bruel of raping her in 2008 and a physiotherapist who alleged he dedicated rape in 2000.
His different accusers embody French tv presenter Flavie Flament, who final month accused him of raping her in 1991 when she was a minor.
She informed AFP on Monday that her case was not one being seemed into by investigators this week, however she criticised what she described as a gradual judicial system.
“Three weeks after my complaint was made public, Patrick Bruel is in police custody,” she informed AFP on Monday.
“What is truly outrageous is that before me, there were women who for months — for years — tried to make themselves heard, and it took the media coverage of my complaint for things to move forward,” she added.
At the peak of his recognition, a interval dubbed “Bruelmania” in French popular culture, youngsters noticed within the singer a masculine preferrred, with enthralled followers gathering exterior locations he was considered in Paris.
Bruel appeared to get pleasure from his picture, in 2000 saying on tv: “I’m easy to seduce, but not easy to keep.”
© 2026 AFP