French tennis coach in court over alleged rapes

A tennis coach appeared in court near Paris on Wednesday charged with the rape and sexual assault of former pupils, including a girl who was twelve at the time of the alleged incidents.

It is the second such case in recent months AFP PHOTO/Dani Pozo

The 48 year old man was arrested on Monday at the tennis club where he was employed in the comfortable Paris suburb of Levallois-Perret.

Between 1999 and 2001, while working at a different club, in Sarcelles, just north of Paris, he is alleged to have raped and sexually assaulted a girl who was twelve when the first alleged incidents took place.

He is also accused of raping and sexually assaulting two seventeen year old girls between 2001 and 2005.

The girls’ lawyers say they kept silent about the matter for years because they felt that they were under his control.

In February, one of the girls filed a police complaint and when the police enquiry was underway the two other girls came forward.

The coach admits having had sexual relations in some cases but maintains that there was no coercion and says that now he realises that such conduct was not “normal”.

Former international tennis player Henri Lecomte who is president of the Levallois tennis club, has announced that the coach has been suspended with immediate effect.

He stressed that the man in question only began work at the club in 2008, and was employed to coach adults there, not under-16s.

Le conte said he was “shocked and devastated [by the news]both as a father and as president of the club”.

In February, top French tennis coach Régis de Camaret was sentenced to ten years in prison convicted of the aggravated rape of two under-age girls.

During his trial, 26 other female tennis players, including champion Isabelle Demongeot also declared on oath that they had suffered sexual assaults or been raped by de Camaret.