Un acquittement du chef de viol ne postule nullement le consentement de la victime

The maxim “Un acquittement du chef de viol ne postule nullement le consentement de la victime” states a crucial limit on what a rape acquittal can mean: it does not establish that the complainant consented. Repeated by Alexandre Farel’s defense at trial, it distinguishes a verdict about criminal liability from a definitive account of Mila Wizman’s experience, even as the defense uses it to urge the jury to acquit.

Legal Meaning

The defense presents the maxim while discussing the legal definition of rape under Article 222-23 of the French Penal Code, which concerns penetration committed through violence, surprise, threat, or coercion. It argues that the case turns on consent and on whether Alexandre intended to impose force, rather than on crude language, the setting, or the mere fact that the couple’s bodies were pressed together. The maxim clarifies that failure to prove the offense beyond the required standard does not itself supply proof of consent.

The distinction leaves room for more than one account of the encounter. In the defense’s formulation, an acquittal might reflect a lack of criminal intent or doubt about whether Alexandre misread Mila’s resistance as unserious; neither possibility logically demonstrates that she agreed. The argument therefore separates the question the jury must decide from a broader judgment about Mila’s wishes and suffering.

Use in the Defense’s Argument

Maître Célérier invokes the maxim in his closing argument after asking jurors to imagine the loss of liberty involved in imprisonment. He urges them not to convict Alexandre in response to public pressure or the social demand for women’s testimony to be heard, and frames acquittal as a matter of honoring the presumption of innocence where doubt remains. In this setting, the maxim is both a qualification and a rhetorical instrument: it acknowledges that acquittal would not certify Mila’s consent, while supporting the defense’s contention that the jury must judge Alexandre’s individual criminal responsibility.

The defense situates the encounter amid an apartment party where students had been drinking, and recounts that Mila accepted a drink, went outside, and followed Alexandre to smoke somewhere more private. It treats these circumstances and the witnesses’ accounts of flirtation as grounds for Alexandre’s possible belief that sex would follow. Those claims belong to the defense’s reconstruction, not to the maxim itself. The maxim’s legal force is narrower: even if jurors accept the defense’s appeal to doubt, the verdict cannot resolve the question of consent by implication.

Repetition and Significance

The maxim appears first in the defense’s discussion of legal precedent and returns near the close of Célérier’s address, where it is set against the noise of media debate and the pressure to deliver a socially resonant verdict. Its repetition makes the distinction difficult to miss: acquittal is not an affirmative finding that Mila consented. At the same time, the defense deploys that distinction to argue that jurors may acquit without claiming to know precisely what she felt or intended.

After the closing argument, the presiding judge asks Alexandre whether he has anything to add. He turns toward Mila and apologizes if she suffered because of him, while saying he never intended to hurt her. The exchange does not settle the disputed meaning of the encounter. It leaves the maxim’s boundary in place: a legal outcome may determine whether the charge is proved, but it cannot, by itself, establish the complainant’s consent.