Psychotic and victim of a form of autism, a 21-year-old young man escapes prison after sexually assaulting an 11-year-old girl this summer in Pamiers.
The weather is very nice and very hot, on July 31, 2022 in Pamiers, a good day to enjoy the holidays by strolling around a flea market. This is where Emilien* strikes up a conversation with Lilou* and his mother, whom he knows by sight. What is going on in the head of the young man of 21 years? No one really knows, but he drags the young girl behind a stage, asks her to sit on his lap and, despite her refusal, kisses her twice on the mouth and strokes her chest over her clothes. Facts of sexual assault which earned him to appear on January 3 before the Foix court.
In front of the court, the young man does not lead off. Approaching the bar, he turns to indicate with a gesture to his father how scared he is.
A confused and bewildered defendant
Questioned, breathless with emotion, tense like a bow, his voice breaks, the tears bead, so much so that President Sun Yung Lazare asks him if he does not want to sit down while he regains his senses. He refuses, preferring to apologize to his young victim and his mother, both present.
But when asked the reasons for his act, nothing: “I don’t know what happened, it just came into my head,” breathes Emilien. “Why did you go behind the stage? insists the president – I don’t know how to tell you. – But you thought about it? – No, I didn’t think of that. “What did you want to do, then?” – “I don’t know, I wanted to go for a ride with her. »
A confusion that is not surprising: under guardianship and placed in an occupational home where he has been following cooking courses for 4 months, Emilien has been followed for many years for mental disorders. The psychiatric expertise carried out within the framework of the investigation thus enumerates a slight mental deficiency, a psychotic character, a partial awareness of his actions, infantile psychosis and impaired discernment.
Called to the bar, his father explains that Emilien was the victim of fetal distress, resulting in a form of autism and hyperactivity. But it is so that his son becomes aware of his act that he himself insisted with the family of Lilou so that she lodges a complaint. “He became aware of it a posteriori, when he was at the police station,” he says. Today he is anxious, he is worried about the sentence that will be pronounced against him. I hope this will help prevent it from happening again. But I’m not in his head…”
“She’s a baby, she still plays with dolls”
Lilou’s mother paints a terrible picture of the consequences of this dramatic encounter: a young girl who no longer dares to go out, terrorized by men to the point of telling her that she no longer wants to be with a man with all her life, that she wants to be with girls, “it’s nicer”. A mother torn between distress and anger, who assures that the defendant was erect and had very good what he was going to do. “She is 11 years old but in her head she is 5-6 years old, she is a baby, she still plays with dolls. Beside her, curled up in her seat, Lilou hugs a baby doll in her arms.
“A painful affair” for Me Baby, lawyer for the civil party, who underlines the need for a “form of understanding”, but also “an even greater prejudice”. In his eyes, only the sanction will allow awareness and responsibility, “the sanction is part of the treatment. »
Noting for its part “a form of anticipation” and an intentionality, the public prosecutor’s office requires against Emilien 10 to 12 months of prison accompanied by a probationary suspension of two years, an obligation of care, a prohibition to come into contact with the victim and the obligation to compensate for the harm suffered.
Arguments contested by the defense, noting that Emilien is “incapable of elaboration”, that his progress allowed him to stop the drug treatment he was taking in favor of psychological monitoring, insisting to finish on the attitude responsible for an entourage that has always supervised and supported him.
Sensitive to the request for a sanction “adapted to his condition and his situation”, the court avoided prison for Emilien. This will be the subject of socio-judicial follow-up for two years, with an obligation to repair the damage suffered, and registration in the file of sex offenders.