• Michel Piron, the owner of the pornographic site "Jacquie et Michel" was indicted on Friday for complicity in rape and human trafficking in an organized gang in an investigation into suspicions of excesses in amateur porn.

  • An investigation was opened by the Paris prosecutor's office in July 2020 and entrusted to the Paris judicial police, after a report sent by Dare feminism, the Effronté-es and the movement of the Nest.

  • Myth of secrecy, non-existence of "Jacquie", meteoric rise...

    20 Minutes

    looked at Michel Piron, the most daring boss of French amateur porn.

“Who are we saying thank you?

".

This sentence, the company Jacquie & Michel has managed to put it in the minds of a good part of the French.

To the point of becoming, over the years, the incarnation of amateur porn and competing with Dorcel, among the leaders in the field.

However, if the name and the slogan are known to all, the face of its founder, Michel Piron, has never been revealed.

The 64-year-old man, usually so mysterious, has been in the spotlight since his indictment on Friday for complicity in rape and human trafficking in an organized gang as part of an investigation into suspicions of excesses in amateur porn.

He was placed under judicial supervision.

Almost twenty years after the launch of Jacquie & Michel, Michel Piron has never given an interview, fueling a little more legends around the creation of the small company, which has become a giant of French porn.

"On the creation of Jacquie & Michel, there are as many stories as interlocutors", explains Robin d'Angelo, journalist and author of the book-investigation

Judy, Lola, Sofia and me

(Edition Goutte d'Or, 2018 ), who infiltrated the French amateur porn industry.

The myth of “Jacquie”

It was at the end of the 1990s that the Jacquie & Michel saga began.

At the time, Michel Piron was a teacher in the town of Odos, near Tarbes, and was training as a webmaster with National Education, according to a book dedicated to him,

Avis aux amateurs, Jacquie's journal and Michel

(Tana editions, 2006), no longer found.

According to the authors, who did not respond to our requests, it was in 1999 that Michel Piron, his new computer skills in his pocket, created an Internet page and put some daring photos of his own holidays on it, being himself a fan of licentiousness.

Faced with success, he launched three years later, in 2002, a libertine photo sharing site "jacquieetmichel.net", where his friends in the libertine community can post their pictures.

And Jacquie in all this?

First cited by several media as his wife, she is then presented as a former conquest.

But in the end, it's nothing like that.

“Everyone got carried away saying that Jacquie & Michel were a couple.

But in fact, Jacquie is the one who sent her first photos to Michel on one of the first instant messengers when he decided to make a website”, explains Robin d'Angelo in his book.

Michel's wife, Araceli Piron, she "never had any responsibility in the history and creation of Jacquie & Michel", told Thibaut, the couple's son - now general manager of the brand - to the journalist .

If she obviously did not participate in the creation of the site, Araceli Piron, is today one of the shareholders, with her husband and her son, of the brand, according to the statutes consulted by

20 Minutes

.

Unlike her husband, Araceli was not indicted, but placed under the intermediate status of assisted witness.

She emerged free at the end of her police custody on Friday.

If he managed his site alone at the beginning, Michel Piron was joined by Abel in 2007, who became his collaborator for ten years.

“Michel and Abel themselves fueled this myth in the press of the little couple of fifty-year-olds from the provinces”, continues the journalist.

From family business to porn giant

After the success of the site for sharing naughty photos, the “Jacquie & Michel” brand was registered in 2004 at the National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI).

In 2007, thanks to the democratization of high-speed Internet, the site took a major turn with the addition of amateur pornographic videos.

And it is a real success.

The brand is transferred to the Tawenda company – which has since become Arès – headed by Michel Piron and his son Thibaut, 34, the group's general manager.

From then on, the family business will never stop expanding by creating several companies, including "Jacquie & Michel TV" broadcast by Canal+ - whose broadcast was suspended on Monday by Canal+ due to the investigation which targets Michel Piron -, "Jacquie and Michel Elite", a high-end version with scenarios and professional actors or even PornEverest.com, an unlimited VOD site modeled on the Netflix model.

The company also has a series of takeovers, such as with Hot Vidéo, a pornographic magazine, or even Colmax, a production and distribution company for X films. Add to that the opening of dozens of sex shops, the creation of derivative products or, most recently, the launch of a cryptocurrency, the Jimizz (JMZ).

In a few years, the small family business has become "the head of the gondola of the pro-amateur sector", estimates Robin d'Angelo, who mentions a turnover of 15 million euros in 2016 for the Arès group.

The cult of secrecy

But what characterizes the brand when you question the players in the sector is the cult of secrecy.

“They are very discreet people.

I have already met Thibaut Piron, the son, but I have never seen Michel Piron, he does not meet anyone, he refuses any interview, there are not even any photos of him, ”says Robin d'Angelo.

Same impression of mystery among adult film actresses, Alba Lala and Nikita Belluci, who have filmed several times for Jacquie & Michel: “I've never seen Michel.

But I know that he still has control over the films, he is the one who validates the profiles of the actors and actresses and the scripts, ”describes Alba, who stopped working with the brand due to irregularities in its contracts.

Nikita Belluci, too, has never met the boss of Jacquie and Michel, but she has already exchanged, only by message, with the son: “Thibaut seems to have taken the place of his father.

Some in the industry say that Michel Piron has withdrawn from the business, that he has completely handed over control to his son, ”adds the porn star. Will Thibaut Piron succeed his father in head of the family business?

In any case, the 30-year-old, already managing director and shareholder of the Arès group, is not targeted in the investigation opened by the Paris prosecutor's office in July 2020.

Company

Police custody, “rape and pimping” and “porn impunity”… Back to the “Jacquie and Michel” case

A woman files a complaint against the Jacquie et Michel site after a shooting


  • Company

  • Porn

  • Investigation

  • Rape

  • sexual assault

  • Pimping

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