He dismisses the complainants’ accusations and regrets an “insignificant” presumption of innocence: Saïd Chabane, ex-president and current owner of the Angers football club (L2), denied Monday before the criminal court the sexual assaults including accuse seven women.
Saïd Chabane, 59, is on trial until Tuesday for sexual assault “committed by a person abusing the authority conferred on him by his position”.
The first complaint was filed in January 2020 by an employee of the SCO in Angers. She denounced facts that she said occurred a few months earlier during a trip to Madrid in which several employees participated.
According to the young woman, 25 years old at the time, Saïd Chabane had caressed her thigh during a taxi ride, before taking her hand and placing it on his erect penis. He then touched her, according to her, on her buttocks and chest during a one-on-one shopping session, to which she “couldn’t and didn’t dare say no”.
“It’s not me, it’s not me,” Saïd Chabane repeats at the stand.
When the president asked him why, in his opinion, the complainant filed a complaint, he replied: “I don’t know. I don’t know. This is the question I have been asking myself for four years. I don’t know.”
– “Is (the complainant) a liar?”, the president insisted a little later.
– “In this context, yes,” he said.
– “Male chauvinism” –
“I filed a complaint to prevent this behavior from happening to other women. I filed a complaint on my own, without any other pressure,” declares the complainant.
The young woman claimed to have “given up on (her) professional future” following her complaint, specifying that she now works in a sector unrelated to her studies in sports marketing.
Another complainant explains that she was attacked while she was alone with Saïd Chabane in the club offices. According to her, Mr. Chabane massaged her shoulders then touched her chest while she was sitting at her post. He then embraced her while caressing her buttocks, she said in her complaint.
“I never found myself alone face to face with her,” replied the defendant on the stand.
The seven complainants were employees of the club or its charcuterie company at the time of the facts reported, between 2014 and 2019.
One of them spoke during the hearing of an “atmosphere of machismo” within the club at the time. “I was advised not to stay alone with (Saïd Chabane),” she added.
In a suit and tie, Saïd Chabane spoke at the opening of the hearing to denounce a “presumption of innocence that has become insignificant”.
“I have been convicted since February 2020 (date of his indictment, NLDR). I faced a virulent campaign, I was the subject of threatening SMS messages, pressure (…) In today’s society, being a man supposedly in power makes you a designated culprit,” he said. he declared on the stand.
Owner of the Angers SCO since 2011, Saïd Chabane described himself as a man who “started from scratch”, “directive” and “demanding” but who never maintained a relationship of “domination” with his employees.
Entangled in a succession of affairs and a catastrophic sporting situation, Saïd Chabane gave up his place as president of the club to his son Romain in March.
Arriving at the head of the club and in its capital in 2011, he was one of the main players in the spectacular recovery of the SCO on a sporting level during the following years, including a return to L1 in 2015.
Relegated at the end of the 2022/2023 season, the SCO has raised its head. At the top of Ligue 2 after 18 days, he is one of the favorites for promotion to Ligue 1 in May.
