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Michelin-starred Paris chef faces rape inquiry

Police have opened a preliminary investigation into a Michelin-starred French chef after a businesswoman accused him of having raped her in February 2015, prosecutors said Wednesday.

Paris prosecutors confirmed a report in the daily Liberation that Florence Chatelet Sanchez had filed the complaint for “rape and sexual assault” against chef Guy Martin.

Contacted by AFP, Martin denied the allegations.

Sanchez’s lawyer, Vanessa Zencker, said police had interviewed her client for four hours last Friday at the station where she went to file her complaint.

The preliminary investigation was opened the same day, the prosecutor’s office said.

Sanchez says the alleged incident took place during a business meeting with the chef at his restaurant in central Paris, Le Grand Vefour.

Lawyer Zencker told AFP that for a long time Sanchez had not wanted to file a complaint, going through a long period in denial.

She was finally encouraged to take action by the wave of denunciations for sexual assault that have driven the #Metoo movement.

Martin told AFP he “formally disputed the accusations”.

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