Fifteen years in prison for French ex-surgeon in extensive abuse case

In a first trial in possibly the largest abuse case ever in France, ex-surgeon Joël Le Scouarnec has been sentenced to fifteen years in prison. He must also undergo mandatory treatment.

A series of lawsuits may follow against Le Scouarnec (70), who is suspected of sexually assaulting more than 300 young children for years, mostly patients in the hospital where he worked. According to the prosecutors, the facts took place between 1986 and 2014. The victims include about as many men as women. The mean age of the victims was 11 years.

The trial in which Le Scouarnec has now been convicted revolves around four victims: two of his nieces, a girl next door and a child who was hospitalized at the age of 4. The former surgeon was found guilty of rape and sexual abuse. He admitted during the trial that he raped his nieces.

The case came to light in 2017, when Le Scouarnec’s 6-year-old girl next door told her mother that he had shown his genitals to her and abused her.

300,000 images of child pornography

During a search of his home, the police found more than 300,000 images of child pornography. Diaries were also found in which he reported extensively on sexual assaults he had committed against boys and girls between 1989 and 2017. According to Le Scouarnec, those diaries were partly fantasy.

The investigation showed that Le Scouarnec collaborated with two other doctors. One of them was previously convicted of possessing and distributing child pornography in Brittany, the other of sexually assaulting children in the southwestern municipality of Jonzac. Le Scouarnec himself was already sentenced in 2005 to a suspended prison sentence of four months for the possession and import of child pornography.

No date has yet been set for the next trial.

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