2023-06-12 19:45:00
At the Mons criminal court, the public prosecutor requested seven years in prison once morest a former instructor from an equestrian center in Dour. He is notably prosecuted for the rape of three minors, aged 14 at the time of the events. The victims also denounce pressure and emotional blackmail.
It was in an equestrian center in Dour that the defendant, Damien D., met and made friends with the victims. He gave them riding lessons. This common passion for horses gave birth to the first messages.
Several minor victims came forward during the investigation, which began at the beginning of June 2021. They denounce the pressure and blackmail exerted by the brilliant rider, who invited them, in the context of conversations on the internet, to maintain sex with him. Several young girls, aged 14, said they had been sexually abused by the defendant.
We are in this form of authority, of ascendancy
“It was entrusting horses precisely to have these young girls under his control and then doing a kind of blackmail by saying that, if they did not practice certain sexual relations with him, it would be probable that the horse would no longer be in his possession. arrangement”, explains Frank Discepoli, lawyer for the civil parties.
The acts of rape with which he is accused took place between March 2019 and June 2021. Damien D. was then a young rider. He represented an authority figure that the teenage girls looked up to. An aggravating circumstance that the court highlighted. “Through his favors that he can give and his advice, we are in this form of authority, of ascendancy that he prints very clearly on the young victims “underlines Pascal Baurain, lawyer for the civil parties.
Defendant denies rape
The defendant did not want his lawyer to grant us an interview. During the hearing, she highlighted the family context in which he grew up with a non-existent sex education. If the man has apologized, he denies the rapes. For him, relationships were consensual. “They maintain their version. They were tricked or in any case tricked and emotionally blackmailed into performing these acts. But they never voluntarily and consciously consented to them”indicates the lawyer for the civil parties.
The public prosecutor has requested a seven-year prison sentence once morest this former instructor at the Dour equestrian center. The defense pleaded a sentence accompanied by a suspended probation for the defendant. Judgment will be delivered on July 27.
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