A French comedian on Wednesday asked forgiveness in court from the victims he maimed in a car crash he caused while on drugs after chemsex party, in a case that caused a media frenzy over his risky lifestyle as well as the rights of unborn children.
Pierre Palmade, the 56-year-old star of French films and stage plays, tested positive for cocaine and a synthetic drug in February 2023 after he crashed into a car driven by a 38-year-old man.
The stricken vehicle was also carrying the driver's six-year-old son and pregnant sister-in-law, both of whom were left fighting for their lives.
The woman's unborn daughter, who she has named Solin, could not be saved after an emergency caesarean section.
"It's very difficult for me to appear today in this courtroom. I've had to do a lot of work with my psychiatrist," the woman, who worked with disabled school pupils, told the court in Melun south of Paris.
Palmade, snared in addiction for years since his glory days in the 1990s and 2000s, told the court he was "overwhelmed" by the victims' testimony about the harm they had suffered.
He said would "ask forgiveness from the very depths of (his) being" for the crash, which happened after he engaged in a three-day chemsex party without sleep.
"We were really like zombies, vegetables, naked and streaked with blood," Palmade told judges.
The comedian faces up to 14 years in prison and a fine of 200,000 euros ($211,000) on charges of causing serious injury, rather than homicide, as the lost baby never lived independently outside the womb.
That failed to meet a legal standard set by France's Court of Cassation.
"I expect this jurisprudence to change and for Solin to be the key that unlocks this change," the female victim told the court.
Her lawyer Mourad Battikh said that better protecting unborn babies in such cases would not put women's right to secure an abortion at risk.
Yuksel Yakut, the man who was driving the other car, appeared in court leaning on a crutch with his arm in a sling, sitting only with difficulty.
"I will never be able to get back to the way I was before," he said, speaking in Turkish through an interpreter, describing injuries to his intestines, liver and hips.
His son -- whose jaw was deformed in the accident -- "doesn't want to go out with his friends and had to repeat the year at school," Yakut added, describing how the boy had been bullied over the way he now looks.
