French writer Gabriel Matzneff, who was the target of an investigation into the rape of a minor following revelations by publisher Vanessa Springora in early 2020, was questioned by police at a public hearing on Wednesday, sources familiar with the matter told AFP.
Police officers at the Central Bureau for the Suppression of Violence Against Individuals (OCRVP), based in Nanterre in the Paris region, questioned him “on the various elements gathered during the investigation, particularly his writings,” according to a source close to him. to the case.
At the request of AFP, the Paris public prosecutor’s office confirmed this free hearing.
His attorney, Me Emmanuel Pierrat, could not be immediately reached to comment on this information.
Twenty-four hours after the publication in early 2020 of Vanessa Springora’s book “The Consent”, in which the publisher had implicated the now 86-year-old writer, the Paris prosecutor’s office had opened a preliminary investigation into the rape of a child under the age of 15.
In her book, Vanessa Springora shared how she was seduced by Gabriel Matzneff when she was not even 14 and he was almost 50, and the weight of that story on her depression-torn life.
She was the first to testify publicly among the teenage girls seduced by Gabriel Matzneff, an author long acclaimed by the French literary scene and a recipient of the 2013 Renaudot Essay Prize.
The author, long tolerated by sections of the intelligentsia and media in France, claims to be a “pedophile” and has written extensively about his relationships with minors and his penchant for sex tourism with boys in Asia.
He has since said he “regrets” his past pedophile practices in Asia, while arguing that “at the time” “no one ever spoke about crime”.
In September 2021, another woman, former British journalist of Italian descent Francesca Gee, in turn accused the writer.
In “The Deadliest Weapon,” self-released, she recounted having a relationship with Gabriel Matzneff when she was 15 in the 1970s, and denounced the chaos of the judicial investigation into this man.
The investigation seems to be moving towards classification without follow-up because of the prescription. A source close to the investigation recently told AFP that “the aim was to close the file before the end of” 2022.
Gabriel Matzneff, who retired to Italy following allegations by Vanessa Springora, claims to have been the victim of revenge from the latter and from Francesca Gee following painful separations.