The case had reacted to the Secretary of State for People with Disabilities, Sophie Cluzel. This Friday, the Bobigny prosecution requested 10 months in prison against the man who had assaulted Kevin *, a disabled adult with autism spectrum disorder whom he had beaten with a stick on June 18, 2019 .
That day, this employee of the Pavillons-sous-Bois Specialized Reception Center (MAS) – an associative structure welcoming adults suffering from pervasive developmental disorders – was on an outing with several residents, including Kevin , then 29 years old.
The assault had been immortalized on a hidden camera by another employee, also present at the scene. On the video, which made the rounds of social networks, we see the man beating him, threatening him: “I will blow your teeth. At MAS, you’ll see! »
Kevin’s mother, Monique, receives this video a few days later via an anonymous submission on the Internet. She hastens to file a complaint against X and the MAS “for violence against a vulnerable person”. The educator is fired.
The ex-MAS employee says he “freaked a cable”
For its part, the Regional Health Agency – the supervisory authority of the establishment – decides to place the structure under provisional administration. She will change managers at the end of 2019, leaving the bosom of the AIPEI association to join the SOS group, a non-profit social enterprise.
Already condemned by justice, the aggressor did not go to the hearing this Friday. During the investigation, he said he “freaked out”, explaining that Kevin was “in crisis” and only acknowledging having hit him on his shoes, when the young man had a hematoma on his thigh.
Another employee – the one who filmed the scene – was also on the dock. She too was absent at the hearing, the judgment of which will be rendered on February 26. The court was unable to say whether she had received her summons.
On the video, we hear him asking the host to stop hitting Kevin and telling the victim to shut up: “Stop or he will hit you”. “It’s not the reaction we expected of her,” insisted the prosecution, who requested a six-month suspended prison sentence against her.
“Instead of filming, she should have called management or the police,” insisted the president, while Kevin’s mother reminded the stand that without this video – which the employee then showed to a colleague – she did not would probably never have known about the facts. Or could not have proved them.
“The ARS only took responsibility after Kevin’s attack”
Two other procedures were also discussed during the hearing. Those of two mothers who filed a complaint before Monique against the MAS for “usual violence against vulnerable people”.
The first, Hélène Ripolli, filed a complaint in August 2018 after finding an unexplained fracture in her son’s ring finger and a second-degree leg burn. The second, Isabelle Casteret, alerted the police in April 2019 after having repeatedly seen bruises on the body of her daughter.
“There were four investigations by the Regional Health Agency within the MAS before Kevin’s attack, but they had yielded nothing. Each time it was Move along, nothing to see. The ARS only took responsibility after Kevin’s assault proved by this video, ”recalled during the hearing the young man’s lawyer, who also defends the other two mothers. On leaving the room, she lamented that the first complaint investigations had still not been successful, allowing the files to be judged at the same time.
“We would like the trial to go beyond the framework of Kevin’s assault, but this trial cannot be that of the MAS,” recalled the prosecution, recognizing all the same problems within the establishment, in particular a “trivialization of violence”. Violence that always worries Kevin. “This morning, when I told him that I was going to trial, he was not well,” described his mother, who represented him on the stand.
Since his assault, he has returned to MAS. “But it’s still complicated,” says Monique. There are always tensions within the establishment with certain staff. Contacted, the Regional Health Agency did not answer our questions about the changes within the structure.
*The name has been changed
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