1 of 1 Sandrine Josso, Member of Parliament of France — Photo: Reproduction/sandrinejosso Sandrine Josso, Member of Parliament of France — Photo: Reproduction/sandrinejosso
Centrist MP Sandrine Josso this week revealed details of the meeting with Senator Joël Guerriau that ended with a sexual assault doping allegation. The report shocked France and mobilized the French political class to strengthen the arsenal of laws against sexual and sexist violence.
The description of a night that would be nothing more than a ritual among colleagues is worthy of a horror film. In an interview with the France 5 channel, 48yearold MP Sandrine Josso from the MoDem party (center) tells of the terrible moments she experienced with 66yearold Senator Joël Guerriau.
The parliamentarian, recently reelected as senator, invited them to celebrate the victory in his Paris apartment on the night of November 14th. According to Josso, they had been friends for ten years and had never had a sentimental connection to each other. The meeting was supposed to last a few minutes during the MP’s recess in the French assembly, but ended with the police.
Josso said on the TV show “C à Vous” that the senator proposed a toast with champagne but served the two glasses of the drink in the kitchen while she waited for him in the living room. “At the first sip I had the feeling that the champagne no longer tasted the same as usual, it was sugary sweet. I thought maybe it was because I was tired or that it was poor quality champagne,” he says.
According to the deputy, the friend’s behavior was also strange. Guerriau insisted on toasting several times, forcing her to drink faster. “That worried me, I found this attitude very bizarre,” he says.
A few minutes later, the deputy experienced palpitations, heat, and dizziness and believed she was hypoglycemic due to her empty stomach. Josso then asked the senator for something to eat, but over time the symptoms worsened.
As an apology, she told Guerriau that she had to return to the assembly to take part in a vote, while he continued to insist that she drink. As he returned to the kitchen to serve more champagne, Josso decided to follow him without him noticing and saw him place a small packet of white powder in a drawer. “Then I understood what was going on,” Josso remembers.
The MP managed to call a taxi and said she had to return to the meeting quickly, trying not to show her nervousness and fearing a reaction from the senator. Guerriau even accompanied her to the exit of the apartment, decided to take her down in the elevator and took her to the taxi that was waiting for her at the exit of the building.
“In the taxi I called a colleague and said: ‘I need help, Senator Joël Guerriau drugged me,’” says Josso. The taxi driver suggested going to a hospital, but the MPs’ colleagues were already waiting for them in the meeting. From there, Josso was taken to a hospital in Paris, which confirmed the presence of ecstasy in her body.
When he left the hospital the next day, the deputy filed a police report. At the senator’s house, police officers found the drug at the spot where Josso had seen it the night before.
Guerriau was detained for questioning as part of an investigation into a flagrant crime, a procedure that could affect parliamentary immunity. The Paris prosecutor’s office accused him of “administering to a person, without his knowledge, a substance capable of impairing his judgment or control of actions, with the aim of committing violence or sexual assault.”
Through his lawyer RémiPierre Drai, the senator presented his version of events, which became a joke on the Internet. He admitted to having a “euphorizing substance” at home but said he did not know it was a drug. He claims he received it from a colleague in the Senate after a tiring campaign for the September election. Guerriau said he was saddened by the death of his pet cat and the condition of a friend who was suffering from cancer. According to his lawyer, the substance was intended to cheer him up.
Guerriau claims that the drug was stored in his house without being consumed until the night before meeting Josso. He would have poured some of the contents of the Ecstasy packet into a champagne glass, which he would then forget in the kitchen and use the next day when he made a toast with his colleague.
“Joël Guerriau is not a predator,” guarantees lawyer RémiPierre Drai. According to the judge, the case is a mess and the senator is convinced that he will prove his innocence in court.
Guerriau was suspended from the Horizons party, from which he could be expelled. On Tuesday (21), the President of the French Senate, Gérard Larcher, officially and publicly called on the parliamentarian to “prove his responsibility” and resign, but this has not happened so far. According to the senator’s lawyer, he intends to remain in office.
Revolt of the political class
Guerriau received no support from any of his colleagues. In a statement, the Horizons party classified the case as “very serious” and said it would “never tolerate the slightest complacency when it comes to sexual and genderbased violence.”
The French political class is calling for a change in the law to automatically punish politicians involved in sexist and sexual assaults. Among the key voices supporting Josso are female parliamentarians who have spoken out following the MP’s revelations.
Socialist MP Christine Beaune is calling for an automatic process to remove Guerriau “from all functions related to the senator’s mandate” while he awaits trial. While environmentalist Sandrine Rousseau says disciplinary action against Guerriau by the Senate and an update of the law are necessary so that people involved in sexist and sexual assaults can no longer run for political office.
In recent years there has been a wave of reports of sexual assaults involving politicians in France.
- One of the most serious cases was that of the former Minister for Ecological Transition, Nicolas Hulotaccused Rape and sexual assault of a minor. The case closed in 2022 without a conviction because the trial deadline had expired.
- Against the former French solidarity minister Damien Abadfrom the rightwing Republican Party three counts of rape. Two cases were dismissed for lack of evidence and the third complaint is currently under investigation. Damien Abad resigned from his position in 2022 following the scandals.
- The Interior Minister, Gerald Darmaninfrom the centrist party A República em Marcha, did not share the same sentiments and remains in office. Accused of rapeThe case was dropped this year due to lack of evidence.
In France, 73% of sexual assault reports are archived and do not result in a conviction.
Congresswoman Sandrine Josso, who says she was traumatized by what she experienced in Senator Joël Guerriau’s apartment, vows to tackle the problem of doping in sexual violence. “Anyone can go through what I went through. “It can’t continue like this,” he says.