The scene took place in a restaurant at 12e Parisian district. The journalist and co-founder of the online media Mediapart Edwy Plenel filed a complaint on March 7 against the director and actress Maïwenn Le Besco, whom he accuses of having attacked him, learned Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Friday March 7 from a source familiar with the matter.
“The complaint for violence, which did not result in incapacity for work, was transmitted to the officer of the public prosecutor’s office, the competent court to deal with the contraventions”said a second source.
In his complaint filed on March 7 and consulted by AFP, the president and publication director of Mediapart relates that on February 22, while having dinner with a lawyer in a restaurant on 12e capital district, “a woman, previously seated, alone, at another table (…) arose and in a very short period of time (I’)seized (…) violently by the hair, throwing his head back and spitting on his face”.
The woman, later identified by restaurant staff as Maïwenn Le Besco, “hastily left the restaurant without anyone being able to intervene given the speed of the action”. No word was spoken during this attack.
No motive given for the assault
If the act was of no physical consequence, it was “completely damaging on a moral and psychological level”is noted in the complaint, leaving the journalist “very traumatized by hate” manifested.
“The act is unique but is no less violent, and somehow traumatic even in the absence of physical damage”reacted to AFP, Pierre-Emmanuel Blard, Mr. Plenel’s lawyer. “Even for this kind of act, there can be no impunity”he added.
Contacted, Maïwenn Le Besco’s lawyer, Julia Minkowski, did not wish to react.
According to the deductions of Edwy Plenel, who “personally never had trouble leaving” with the director, it is pointed out in the complaint, the articles published by Mediapart on the suspicions of rape targeting Luc Besson, his former companion and father of one of his children, could have motivated his gesture.
Accused of rape by actress Sand Van Roy, the filmmaker benefited from a dismissal confirmed on appeal in the spring of 2022. The actress filed a complaint for rape with the Belgian justice which must examine its admissibility.
