Europe1 .fr with AFP 2:36 p.m., June 21, 2022
Four people have been indicted in Montpellier in an investigation into suspicions of violence and pimping on young women in disinheritance from the Lyon region". The departmental security service of Hérault and the group for the fight against pimping of the Territorial Directorate of the Judicial Police were seized.
Four people suspected of violence to force "very young destitute women from the Lyon region" into prostitution have been indicted in Montpellier, where a pimping network had recently set up, the national police announced on Tuesday.
On May 17, two witnesses had seen, in Montpellier, a very young woman in a swimsuit fleeing from a vehicle occupied by three men and three women in their twenties, said in a press release the Departmental Directorate. Public Security (DDSP) of Hérault.
“Caught up by two men present in the car then beaten in the face and strangled, the victim was then propelled inside the vehicle”, which disappeared, according to the same source.
An organized pimping network
The investigation quickly identified a 26-year-old man from Lyon, "very unfavorably known to the police, in particular for aggravated pimping", continues the text.
Given the facts, the Montpellier public prosecutor's office jointly seized the Hérault departmental security service and the anti-pimping group of the Territorial Directorate of the Judicial Police, for aggravated pimping in an organized gang and kidnapping/sequestration.
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Their investigations "highlighted a pimping network in an organized gang originating from the Lyon suburbs, recently installed in Montpellier and operating via an escorting website, in Montpellier apartments rented on the Airbnb platform", specifies the DDSP.
Four people charged
Four people, three men aged 22, 25 and 26 and a 23-year-old woman, companion and accomplice of one of the three men, were arrested on June 14 in flagrante delicto.
"In the prostitution apartment and in the place of life, the initial victim was found, in the company of two other young women: one of them had a fractured jaw and the other was a minor", according to the police.
These "pimps are suspected of having exploited very young abandoned women from the Lyon region", continues the text, which specifies that "two of the three men are known for similar acts".
At the end of their police custody, the four were indicted.
The three men were imprisoned and the woman placed under judicial supervision.
A judicial inquiry has been opened.