Overview
- About 240–250 women have come forward to authorities alleging that senior Culture Ministry official Christian Nègre covertly gave them powerful diuretics during recruitment meetings.
- Accounts describe tea or coffee laced with fast-acting illegal diuretics followed by lengthy walks far from restrooms, including through Paris’s Tuileries Gardens.
- Police searching Nègre’s belongings in 2018 reported finding a spreadsheet titled “Esperimenti” that logged dosing times and women’s reactions, which now underpins the case.
- Nègre was removed from public service and placed under formal investigation in 2019, continued working in the private sector, and has not yet faced a criminal trial.
- Some complainants have received civil compensation from the State, the Culture Ministry was not found liable, and the revelations have intensified France’s debate over drug-facilitated abuse.