A 55-year-old judge in the French city of Dijon has been arrested after trying to pimp out his 12-year-old daughter to other men on a “libertine” dating forum website.
The judge is said to have been a member of the website’s community, along with his wife, and went as far as proposing that other adult male members of the community not only have sex with his wife but rape his young daughter as well.
According to investigators, the judge would initially offer various men the option to sleep with his wife and later on would mention his daughter. The messages went on for months but none of the users of the forum accepted the proposal, Le Parisien reports.
Earlier this month, both the 55-year-old and his wife were placed in custody but the wife was released after claiming to have no knowledge of her husband’s activities. She is currently not facing any charges.
In his defence, the judge claimed that the messages were just “fantasies”. He admitted that he had sent the messages in question. The daughter of the couple was also questioned by investigators and claimed she had not been a victim of any kind of sexual assault or abuse.
Prosecutors have charged the 55-year-old with “aggravated corruption of minors” and “offer, even without effect, to a person to commit rape against a minor, sexual assault or corruption of a minor”, which could see a ten-year prison sentence and a fine of up to a million euros.
French Minister of Justice Nicole Belloubet has since suspended the judge from office as well.
The arrest is just the latest revelation of a senior judicial official in Europe in recent weeks.
In Germany, a Hamburg constitutional judge was revealed to have major ties to far-left extremist Antifa groups and the banned terrorist organisation known as the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK).
In Italy, meanwhile, a WhatsApp chat between two magistrates was leaked showing judges agreeing to attack former Interior Minister Matteo Salvini while privately agreeing his policies were effective.