The Altice Media group, owner of RMC and BFM-TV, announced on Sunday January 16 the opening of an internal investigation after learning that its star journalist Jean-Jacques Bourdin was the subject of a complaint for “sexual assault” on the part of from a colleague.
“We spoke with Jean-Jacques Bourdin, who vigorously disputed the facts denounced. (…) For the sake of transparency, Altice Media is having an internal investigation carried out to ensure that no facts of this type have been brought to the attention of the managers or colleagues of the interested parties (complainant and defendants)”, the group said.
Altice Media specifies following “with the greatest attention the possible developments of this case” and take “all the measures that may be required depending on its development”.
Forcibly “kissing repeatedly”
The complainant, a former journalist for BFM-TV and RMC, now 33, worked ” for several years ” with the 72-year-old interviewer on the morning show of BFM-TV – RMC. She claims he tried to sexually assault her during a business trip to Corsica in 2013, according to the story told by The Parisian and confirmed by his lawyer, Laure Heinich.
In the regional daily, she explains that she had strongly hesitated to come to this trip, knowing that Mr. Bourdin would be present. She had finally accepted the invitation on the condition of being accompanied by her brother.
While bathing in the hotel pool one morning, the star reporter reportedly “grabbed by the neck and tried to kiss her several times” according to his declarations to the police officers of the police station of 16and borough. Jean-Jacques Bourdin would then have sent him “For several months of insistent emails and SMS”, still according to this story.
In the regional daily, she also explains the reasons for her complaint, almost ten years after the facts:
“I am no longer a young journalist afraid of losing my job and I know that I did not have to go through what I went through. »
Dismissed from the RMC morning show in the summer of 2020 after nineteen years of service, Jean-Jacques Bourdin is leading his last season at the head of the 8:30 a.m. political interview on radio and BFM-TV, the French channel. news from the Altice Media group. It is at the heart of the system set up by the channel for the presidential election.