“Favorable” to the lifting of his parliamentary immunity requested by justice, Damien Abad saw his wish granted by the office of the Assembly. The former minister is the subject of a preliminary investigation for rape. “I want to be heard by the courts like any other citizen, under any regime whatsoever,” explained the deputy for Ain last Wednesday. Because of this decision of the office of the Assembly, its highest collegial body, the deputy (related to Renaissance) can in particular be placed in police custody.
There was no debate during the meeting of the Bureau of the Assembly. “The position of our group is constant: parliamentary immunity must be systematically lifted when the facts do not concern our parliamentary work”, indicated Aurore Bergé, the patron saint of the Renaissance deputies. “So we were obviously in favor of lifting Damien Abad’s immunity,” she added.
A complaint at the end of June 2022
Damien Abad, elected representative of Ain, assures him: “From the opening of the preliminary investigation, I always said that I was at the disposal of justice in order to be able to answer the questions of the investigators and thus confirm my innocence in the face of the ignoble calumnies of which I am the target. The former head of LR deputies, taken from Emmanuel Macron on the right, was appointed Minister of Solidarity, Autonomy and People with Disabilities in May 2022.
From the day after his appointment, Mediapart relayed accusations of rape against him, dating from 2010 and 2011. The complaints were closed in 2012 then 2017. But at the end of June 2022, a complaint was once again filed, leading to the opening of the preliminary investigation in Paris for attempted of rape.
Damien Abad, re-elected deputy for a third term, left the government in early July 2022. The “conditions of serenity” were “no longer present”, explained Olivier Véran, government spokesperson.
