Tied naked to a chair and abused for hours. The public prosecutor's office Bayonne opened an investigation into sexual assault and violence after revelations of alleged and “humiliating harassment” by him emerged in the French press Aurelien Largeau, a well-known star chef, to a kitchen assistant. Abuses which the assistant chef later denied and downplayed the incident as a simple “game”. The chef was fired anyway and the case is causing controversy in France. The events – according to the French media, which reprinted the story – date back to December 2 in the kitchen of the Palais de Biarritz hotel, in the elegant seaside town on the Basque coast frequented by surfers and luxury vacationers. And they led to the firing of chef Aurélien Largeau, 31, who was hired in 2020 to run the five-star hotel's gourmet restaurant.
INSIGHTS
What happened
The chef himself has had a star in the Michelin guide since last year. According to the press, a cooking assistant was abused and filmed while tied naked to a chair with an apple in his mouth and a carrot in his butt. All in front of the kitchen staff and in the presence of Chef Largeau. The images taken and shared on social networks have since been removed. The chef “formally denied the allegations made against him” and defended himself by denying the facts, calling them “false and defamatory” and announcing that he was preparing his defense together with his lawyers. And even the victim of the alleged harassment denies the reconstruction: “It was just a game,” he wrote on Instagram.
The reproach
The city of Biarritz, the main shareholder of Socomix, the company that owns the palace walls and whose human resources management is delegated to the Hyatt group, declined to comment on the matter. “We learned the information from the press,” assured one of the Socomix administrators, Patrick Destizon, opposition councilor in Biarritz. “This incident was not discussed during the board meeting on December 21, at which the hotel management presented its quarterly management report,” he emphasized. “The management of the Hôtel du Palais is aware of the worrying incident on the hotel premises and the images circulating,” a manager of the Hyatt group, which manages this structure, told France Presse. “This incident does not reflect the values we defend,” the same source added, without commenting further. The manager then reminded that “the safety, health and well-being of our colleagues, our customers and our partners are our absolute priority”.
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