Relatives of the two players from the French rugby team who have been detained for a week in Argentina and charged with aggravated rape went to the Mendoza prosecutor’s office (north-west) on Monday. Pau second row Hugo Auradou, 20, and La Rochelle third row Oscar Jegou, 21, were charged with aggravated rape, as it was committed in a group, on Friday by the Mendoza prosecutor’s office where the alleged acts took place. They claim that the sexual relationship was consensual and deny having acted with violence.
“The prosecution and the defense are gathering evidence,” Martin Ahumada, a spokesman for the Mendoza justice system, told AFP.
On Monday morning, the parents of the first, former rugby player David Auradou and his wife Marie, went to the prosecutor’s office. They were seen leaving the premises with the defense without making any statements. She feels “like a mother with her son in prison accused of rape, of course she is worried,” lawyer Rafael Cúneo told reporters.
“France is worried, rugby is worried, I am worried. We are obviously worried and we will work with all the seriousness in the world to prove their innocence,” he added. An aunt of Oscar Jegou, whose name has not been revealed, was also part of the group.
The defendants will remain in custody until a hearing, which could take place within 10 days of the indictment, determines whether they should await trial in prison or under house arrest as requested by the defense.
Natacha Romano, one of the plaintiff’s lawyers, told AFP that her client met Auradou at a nightclub where the players went after the first test match of the tour on July 6 and that she accompanied him to the hotel where they were staying. With “ferocious violence,” he beat her and sexually abused her several times, according to the lawyer. Shortly after, Jegou came in and “savagely started the same acts again,” she added.
If convicted, the defendants face eight to 20 years in prison, with Auradou’s sentence potentially longer if it is proven that he committed the same alleged crime multiple times.
The rest of the French XV has returned from Argentina
The French XV, which left Buenos Aires on the night of Sunday to Monday at the end of this South American tour which turned into a nightmare, landed at Roissy-Charles de Gaulle airport on Monday at around 7:45 p.m., two hours late, noted an AFP journalist on board the Blues’ plane.
The French, dressed in their official blue uniforms, traveled on board an Air France commercial flight that also included the Argentinian athletes on their way to the Paris Olympics, which begin on July 26, according to AFP. Some of them took a connecting flight home, such as Toulon scrum-half Baptiste Serin, who was named captain of the French XV for this tour.
A few hours before the first revelations about this alleged rape of which Auradou and Jegou are accused, another player from the French XV, Toulon full-back Melvyn Jaminet (25 years old, 20 caps), had been removed from the group after making racist remarks in a video published on July 7, which he said he was “ashamed of”.
The sporting record of the South American tour of the Blues, far in the background, is two victories – on July 6 against Argentina (28-13) then on July 10 in Uruguay (43-28) – and a defeat against the Pumas (33-25) on Saturday.
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