2023-07-08 16:45:01
Will the lawyer have to swap his robe for the clothes of an accused? The prospect of a trial is becoming clearer in any case for Me Alex Ursulet, whose Paris prosecutor’s office requested, this Thursday, July 6, the referral to the criminal court. Figure of the Parisian bar, former defender of serial killer Guy Georges, the 66-year-old criminal lawyer has been under investigation since the rape complaint filed in September 2019 by a young colleague and former trainee from his firm, aged 25 at the time. of the facts denounced, in 2018.
First placed under the more favorable status of assisted witness, the lawyer had been indicted in December 2021. He never ceased to proclaim his innocence, and to question the word of his accuser, speaking of “machination” and “set-up”. He for his part filed several complaints, in particular for “slanderous denunciation”.
In its 23-page indictment, which Le Parisien has read, the prosecution on the contrary considers the facts “perfectly characterized” and requests that the famous criminal lawyer be tried for “rape by a person who has abused the authority conferred on him by his functions “, punishable by a sentence of twenty years in prison.
“Alex is sick, if I stay here I will die”
In her complaint, the young woman explained that she had suffered digital penetrations in January 2018, when she returned to the firm after having lunch with Me Ursulet, barely three weeks after starting her internship. During this meal, where, on authority, he would have ordered an alcoholic drink, she explains that she felt uncomfortable and even “in danger”, while he bombarded her with intrusive questions about her sexuality. He would also have told her that he had “trained” a former collaborator in the past.
Back in the office and having made sure that they were alone, he would have first asked her to uncross her legs so that he could see them better. Then would have established a climate of domination, throwing a charger on the ground for her to pick it up, demanding that she light cigarettes for him. According to her account, Me Ursulet then approached her in her wheelchair, kissing her and sniffing her, before lowering her pantyhose and panties and penetrating her with his fingers several times.
“It’s good, we’ve made good progress,” he even said, pointing to his erect crotch. Paralyzed, she explains that she was unable to react. While she was getting dressed, he would also have ordered her to buy stockings. What seem to attest to two SMS sent in the following hours: “magnificent”, then “the stockings! “.
The same day, the complainant had confided in one of her friends, before slamming the door of the office the next day. “Alex is sick, if I stay there I will die”, she had dropped to the collaborator of Me Ursulet, explaining to him the reasons for his departure. Noting her absence, Me Ursulet had then bombarded her with calls – more than forty in a few hours – while calling her school to denigrate her.
A “manipulator”, alternating between seduction and roughness
He has since claimed that the purpose of the meal was precisely to signify the end of their collaboration, because of his inappropriate behavior with clients of the firm. He also denies having offered her the internship a year earlier, when he met her at an assize trial. As for the SMS, “magnificent” would allude to a pleading discussed together on the telephone, a conversation which would have been cut off and would therefore have ended by message. As well as “the stockings!” would be an answer to a question about an outfit that he would consider unacceptable for a woman.
An argument invalidated by the use of telephone bills, as well as the explanations delivered by certain key defense witnesses, who then contradicted themselves or partially reversed their remarks. If former collaborators and relatives, including the companion of Me Ursulet, Anne de Bourbon Sicily, gave him her support, the hearings of several others cast doubt on the behavior of the famous lawyer.
Described as “manipulative”, alternating between seduction and harshness, even threats, it appears that other trainees had left the firm prematurely. And even that some lawyer school directors advised their students not to do their internship there. The psychiatrist who examined him goes even further, estimating that he “presents indisputable personality disorders of the narcissistic register (…) of an obsessive and paranoid nature” and suffers from a “pathology of the ego”.
Still active thanks to his call
Relying on the complainant’s constancy, her immediate confessions, the intense psychological impact noted by her relatives, to whom she openly spoke of suicide, as well as the insidious process in which she found herself trapped, the prosecution concludes that ‘there are sufficient elements to establish the reality of the rape’.
“This is one more step in the direction of what my client has been denouncing for four years, the path is still long, but we are approaching it calmly”, commented Me Thibault Laforcade, lawyer for the complainant, who is now waiting. the decision of the investigating judge.
Contacted, Alex Ursulet’s lawyers could not be reached this Saturday. In the event of conviction, the latter would be forced to unscrew his plate: struck off at the end of December 2019 from the Paris bar, he had appealed and had been able to continue to practice, the Bar Council then deciding to wait for the outcome of the criminal proceedings to make a final decision.
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