She made a facial composite of her rapist (20–25 years old, wore white sneakers and a dark jacket), learning that she, in fact, had not been the only one to do so: between late 1979 and April 1981, nine other young women had reported being sexually assaulted in the 8th and 9th arrondissements.
[2] On April 12, a patrol of Marseille peacekeepers intercepted a man matching the composite sketch drawn by Sylviane, coupled with the fact that he behaved suspiciously.
They called him for an identity check: his name was Luc Tangorre, he was 22 years old, a sports student, had a Citroën 2CV, and claimed that he was waiting for a friend to come.
A dozen days later, she was presented a bunch of suspects while behind a beam splitter, Sylviane said this about Luc Tangorre: "The individual fits perfectly, I recognize him so".
The police searched his home the next day, and found a dummy revolver containing some dried mud, a moped and a khaki raincoat, crowned with suspicious spots.
The case became so well-publicized, that even intellectuals began to defend Luc Tangorre, including historian Pierre Vidal-Naquet, writers Marguerite Duras and Françoise Sagan, and the politicians Robert Badinter, Albin Chalandon, Jean-Claude Gaudin and Dominique Baudis.
His family and friends firmly believed in his acquittal, with his defense being provided by Anne and Jean Dissler, François Chevallier and Paul Lombard.
Their testimonies weighed heavily, while Tangorre defended himself by presenting alibis that could be hardly be proven or emanated from his entourage: among others, on the evening that he supposedly raped Sylviane, he was hospitalized.
Rumors circulated: his family financed this counter-expertise, and his brother gave a later testimony to justify the traces of the product that had "the characteristics of petroleum jelly", when a witness had largely explained the origin of these lipid spots observed on the raincoat from the beginning of the inspection.
On July 21, 1987, after the rejection of an appeal in cassation, Tangorre obtained a presidential pardon from François Mitterrand, but only a partial one, which reduced his sentence to four years.
They were standing at the outskirts of Marseille when a man driving Renault 4, aged 30, with brown hair and a friendly demeanor, offered to bring them to Lyon.
[1] When the police questioned the American students, they revealed that they had an excellent memory: they accurately described the green 4L (license plate, a missing handle, the gas gauge not working) in which they were violated, the physique of the individual (in his 30s, wearing a yellow Lacoste polo shirt, a signet ring, white jeans and gray/black sneakers).
Constable Alain Derbecq requisitioned the gynecological doctor of the Caremau Hospital in Nîmes, whom concluded: for Mac Luney, "in total, the interrogation and the clinical examination are suggestive of rape with a rectal radio, although there are no traumatic lesions at the vulvar or the anal level", and for Ackermann "according to what the patient said, and according to the clinical examination, although there was no trauma, it may be thought that there was a rectal radio of force."
The gendarmes again became interested in Luc Tangorre, learning that he lived in Lyon, where he ran a tobacco shop on the Place Carnot, on Marigny, bought after his release with the help of his parents.
On letters of rogatory, Christian Lernould, investigating judge at the court of Nîmes, ordered the gendarmes to bring in Tangorre for questioning on October 24.
It was concluded that Tangorre could have had the material time to carry out this course to violate them, even if, at the end of the third trial, the magistrates at the cour d'assises of Montpellier recognized the fact that "contradictions as they appear in the story of the initial journey, as described by the victims".
Nevertheless, the evidence taken from both Mac Luney and Ackermann, which should logically exonerate Tangorre if tampered with or simply fixed, was rare and altered, which destroys all possibility of exploitation.
Tangorre argued that it was impossible to remain a virgin after the type of rape Ackermann had suffered, and that Mac Luney could not reasonably explain by what miracle she could, eight weeks after the fact, reproduce from memory the design of the jacket after her traumatic condition, with precision comparable to that of tracing.
The psychiatric experts stated, in the event of his guilt, that it could be a case of dissociative personality disorder and that the "normal" Luc Tangorre could not admit he was forced to refer himself to under the hypothesis.
[5] Following the verdict, Vidal-Naquet apologized in a column published in Le Monde, recognizing that without the intervention of the support committee, Tangorre would not have been pardoned and the rapes of the two Americans would've never occurred.
Domiciled in the Lyon area, since his release from prison in 2000,[7] Luc Tangorre became the talk of the town again on August 12, 2014, when he was indicted in Grau-du-Roi, on suspicion of sexually assaulting a 12-year-old girl.