France: 74-year-old ‘pedophile’ surgeon convicted for raping 299 children
A 74-year-old former French surgeon was sentenced to 20 years in jail after he confessed to raping hundreds of his patients over two decades between 1989 and 2014.
This court sketch shows lawyer Maxime Tessier (L) and retired French surgeon Joel Le Scouarnec during the trial of Le Scouarnec on charges of assaulting or raping 299 patients, at the Criminal Court in Vannes.(AFP)
Most of the victims, including boys and girls, were children. During trial, the surgeon confessed to raping his granddaughter and committed the same crime on 5-year-old niece in 1985.
The convict, Joël Le Scouarnec, is already serving a 15-year prison sentence for rape and sexual assault of four children, including two nieces.
Documented his crimes
The latest trial dates back to a 2017 case registered by a 6-year-old neighbour’s parent against Le Scouarnec for exposing himself in front of their daughter and touching her inappropriately through the fence separating their properties.
Authorities searched the surgeon’s home and found more than 300,000 photos, 650 pedophilic, zoophilic and scatological video files, as well as notebooks in which Le Scouarnec described himself as a pedophile and explained the horrific details of his crimes committed so far.
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Le Scouarnec had described his acts in graphic detail, along with the names of his targets, in his notebooks, which became a crucial piece of evidence during the trial.
The surgeon’s exploitative technique was to disguise sexual abuse as medical care and target his young patients during moments they were alone in their hospital rooms or when they were unlikely to remember the abuse after ‘medical care.’
A group of alleged victims, members of women’s collectives, NGO’s and unions gather in front of the courthouse, on the day of the verdict of ex-surgeon Joel Le Scouarnec, charged with the aggravated rape and sexual assault against hundreds of children over several decades, in Vannes, Brittany, France.(REUTERS)
Victims were the ‘destination of fantasies’
During the trial, Le Scouarnec offered apologies for his crimes, but remained calm, composed and emotionless, AP reported.
“I didn’t see them as people. They were the destination of my fantasies. As the trial went on, I began to see them as individuals, with emotions, anger, suffering and distress,” he told the court.
“I don’t show emotion, that’s just how I am. That doesn’t mean I don’t feel it, but I don’t express it,” Le Scouarnec added.
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Prosecutor blames French bureaucracy
According to AP, the trial in Brittany brings France’s one of the largest ever child sex abuse cases to a closure, but raised questions about how a pedophile surgeon was able to commit such crimes over two decades. Among the surgeon’s 299 victims, 158 were boys and 141 girls.
During the trial last Friday, prosecutors described Le Scouarnec as “a devil in a white coat.” Prosecutor Stéphane Kellenberger partly blamed the French bureaucracy for the crime. The surgeon was allowed to continue his profession until his arrest in 2017, despite a conviction in 2005 for possessing and importing child sexual abuse material.
“Should Joël Le Scouarnec have been the only one in the defendant’s box?” Kellenberger asked the court.
Protestors react during a demonstration in support of the victims of former surgeon Joel Le Scouarnec outside the court in Vannes, western France on May 19, 2025.(AFP)
After four months of prison time in 2005, Le Scouarnec was appointed as a hospital practitioner the following year. Rights groups have slammed the government for inaction and said that no measures were taken to suspend the convict’s medical license or limit his access to children after his conviction.
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Victims, who were identified from Le Scouarnec’s notebook, complained of a perceived lack of attention during the trial. Two of them died before the verdict.
“This trial, which could have served as an open-air laboratory to expose the serious failings of our institutions, seems to leave no mark on the government, the medical community, or society at large,” a group of victims said in a statement.
