The Grenoble Prosecutor's Office launched a call for probable witnesses in relation to a 79-year-old man suspected of aggravated rape and sexual assault committed against 89 minors in several countries between 1967 and 2022. The suspect, former teacher Jacques Leveugle, has also confessed to the murders of his mother and aunt, which occurred decades ago.
First modification: 02/10/2026 - 19:47
A French prosecutor asked this Tuesday, February 10, for more testimony in a case of mass abuse in nine countries, after accusing former educator Jacques Leveugle, 79, of rape and sexual assault against 89 minors since the 1960s.
Prosecutor Etienne Manteaux spoke to journalists in the city of Grenoble, in the southeast of the country, to publicize the case of the former teacher, who also confessed to having murdered his terminally ill mother and his elderly aunt.
In an unusual move, French authorities identified the suspect, who was born in 1946 in Annecy, an Alpine town about an hour's drive from Grenoble. "It is necessary to know this name because the objective is for potential victims to come forward," explained the prosecutor.
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When asked why prosecutors did not disclose the information when Leveugle was placed under investigation, Manteaux responded that it was a "somewhat unusual case and we wanted to first ensure the veracity of the facts."
"It then became essential to allow victims who could not be identified and who were not going to be heard to come forward," he added.
Leveugle, who is accused of committing sexual crimes against minors between 1967 and 2022, has been in custody since his indictment in 2024, the prosecutor said.
“He traveled to different countries”
Leveugle would have committed the crimes against minors in Germany, Switzerland, Morocco, Niger, Algeria, the Philippines, India, Colombia and the French overseas territory of New Caledonia, where he worked as an independent teacher and instructor, the prosecutor specified.
His varied roles included caving, or cave study, instructor and French teacher.
"He traveled to different countries and in each of these places where he established himself to give private classes and teach, he met young people and had sexual relations with them," according to the prosecutor.
The number of victims was established from writings compiled on a USB memory by the man, in which reference is made to "sexual relations" with minors between 13 and 17 years old.
The USB drive on which the man kept the documents was discovered by his nephew, who "was questioning his uncle's emotional and sexual life," Manteaux added.
"It contains 15 volumes of very dense material and investigators will review and read all of these writings and identify 89 minors," he added.
During the investigation, the man also confessed to suffocating his mother, a terminally ill cancer patient, with a pillow in the 1970s, according to the prosecutor.
In addition, he suffocated his 92-year-old aunt, also with a pillow, in the 1990s, the prosecutor said.
"He decided to kill her too, so while she was sleeping, he took a pillow and suffocated her," the prosecutor said.
In his "memoirs," the man had written that he had "killed two people," Manteaux noted.
Meanwhile, an investigation has been launched into the alleged crimes committed. The suspect "justifies his actions, saying that he would like someone to do the same for him if he found himself in that end-of-life situation," the prosecutor said.
Another shocking case
In May 2025, a French court sentenced retired doctor Joel Le Scouarnec to 20 years in prison after confessing to sexually abusing or raping 298 patients between 1989 and 2014.
Of them, more than 250 victims were under 15 years old.
Victims and children's rights advocates say the case highlighted systemic failures that allowed Le Scouarnec to repeatedly commit sexual crimes.
Read also 'The devil in a white coat': the final phase of the trial of the French pedophile surgeon Le Scouarnec
With AFP
This article was adapted from its original English version.
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