The Outreau trial was a 2004 criminal trial in Northern France on various counts of sexual abuse against children. The trial and the appeal trial revealed that the main witness for the prosecution, convicted for the abuse, had lied about the involvement of other suspects, who were in fact innocent. Several innocent suspects had nevertheless spent years jailed on remand and one had committed suicide.
The trials resulted in a national outrage in France, with journalists, politicians and the public opinion questioning how such a miscarriage of justice could happen, with innocent men and women being held for years in jail on unfounded suspicions. In January 2006, a parliamentary inquiry was created, with President Jacques Chirac calling the affair a "judicial disaster".
Read more about Outreau Trial: The Outreau Affair, Film
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“You may talk about Free Love, if you please, but we are to have the right to vote. To-day we are fined, imprisoned, and hanged, without a jury trial by our peers. You shall not cheat us by getting us off to talk about something else. When we get the suffrage, then you may taunt us with anything you please, and we will then talk about it as long as you please.”
—Lucy Stone (1818–1893)