Toulouse: the manager of an Indian establishment sentenced for assaulting 10 young women who worked in his restaurant
The owner of an Indian restaurant in the center of Toulouse recruited students in a very precarious situation. During the service, he sexually assaulted them, taking advantage of their hold on them. He received a two-year suspended prison sentence.
In the waiting room, the defendant allowed himself a few bursts of laughter a few meters from three of his 10 victims, young women aged 19 to 22. This former manager of an Indian restaurant in downtown Toulouse was tried on May 17 before the Toulouse criminal court for having sexually assaulted students who had the misfortune to work for him.
Small, chubby face, the head of a tattooed tiger under the forearm, this man who left India for France in 2007, radically changes his behavior in front of the magistrates and activates his tear glands. In the preamble, he stammers in hesitant French that he “respects all women and that he is sorry for having done wrong”, before evoking his three-year-old child and bursting into tears. Carole Mauduit, the president of the criminal court, does not seem to be moved by her melodramatic outbursts. She tells by “what stratagem”, he recruited his prey. Young women who are often foreigners, most of them in great precariousness. “Some did not even have enough to pay for black pants and a white shirt for the service”, relates the magistrate. As soon as his wife was absent, he took the opportunity to “grope” his staff, going so far as to rub his erect penis on his victims.
“Given the frequency of assaults and the number of victims, it makes you wonder when you reserve the time to cook”, mocks Francis Boyer, the representative of the public prosecutor’s office.
The prosecutor paints the portrait of a calculating man: “Everything was calculated by this individual who, I remind you, holds a master’s degree in economics. The job advertisements were posted on Facebook. There was no employment contract and strangely you never recruit any man even to do the diving.. You take care to inquire before acting, to know if your young victim was really single. Knowing their financial difficulties, you went as far as à’ to offer 1,500 euros to one of them to obtain a sexual relationship.”
Community pressure?
The story of these multiple attacks revives moments that are too painful for the civil parties. Some leave the room in tears.
Their lawyer, Me Guillaume Faugère, points this out to the magistrates to show how the acts of the defendant had a major hold on his clients. Silent until then, Me Hélène Simon-Grassa, the defendant of the defendant explains the acts of her client by a certain form of sexual misery and the “weight of her community where women and men are strictly separated”.
Francis Boyer requires three years in prison, two of which are suspended. The Indian restaurateur converted today to a kitchen clerk receives a two-year suspended prison sentence, an obligation of care and the payment of damages to his victims.