PARIS — A public trial opened in Paris in May 2026 involving a school assistant accused of sexually assaulting nine children aged 3 to 5. The 36-year-old defendant, who has not been publicly identified, is accused of carrying out the alleged assaults while supervising children in bathrooms, during lunch breaks, and in after-school care between August 2024 and April 2025.

The case emerged in April 2025 after several children told their parents they had allegedly been sexually abused at a nursery school. The defendant has denied any sexual abuse against children. In addition to the charges involving minors, the defendant is also accused of sexually harassing two co-workers and sexually assaulting one of them.

Trial proceedings involving minors in France are typically held behind closed doors, but the parents of the children agreed to open this trial, inspired by Gisèle Pelicot’s decision to make her drug and rape trial public. According to their lawyers, some parents cited Pelicot’s motto that “shame must change sides” to abusers, not victims. The children, aged 3 to 5 at the time of the alleged abuse, do not have to attend the trial, and a judge has read their testimonies to investigators.

Outside the courthouse, protesters carried a banner reading: “Because no child should be afraid to go to school.” Families said the trauma of the alleged assaults was compounded by what they described as a struggle to be taken seriously by authorities. An initial warning raised by a mother months earlier was apparently ignored by the school.

Rebecca Royer, a lawyer representing several families, said that “what we are expecting is a real turning point in child protection, meaning we expect the government and municipalities to implement real measures to protect children, but also to provide real resources.” Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau said investigations were underway involving 84 nursery schools, about 20 elementary schools, and about 10 daycare centers in the capital.

Paris Mayor Emmanuel Grégoire, elected in March 2026, has made combating child abuse an “absolute priority” and unveiled a 20 million euro ($22 million) plan to address what he described as “major dysfunction” in the city’s school supervision system. Grégoire pledged to immediately suspend any school employee suspected of abusing children. He said 78 school and after-school staff members have been suspended in the city since the beginning of 2026, including 31 over suspicions of sexual violence. Before becoming mayor, Grégoire publicly revealed that he had been sexually abused as a child while attending elementary school between the ages of 9 and 10.