Paris - The trial of 20 adolescents - including two girls - accused in the group rape of a 15-year-old girl opened in Paris on Monday, in an example of what sociologists say has become a shocking ritual in some of France's run-down suburbs.
Performing what is known as a "tournante" - or "take-your-turn" - the 18 male accused are said to have shared the girl around for a series of forced sex acts carried out in public toilets or the basements of blocks of flats.
The two females are charged with conspiracy to commit group rape, and are alleged to have procured the victim in December 1998 by luring her to the Paris suburb of Argenteuil.
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The attacks took place over several weeks, and the unnamed girl is said to have been threatened afterwards with death if she told her story to police.
| 'He will allow his mates to make use of her' |
According to experts, the practice of "tournantes" was first identified in the late 1980s among gangs of immigrant teenagers from the poor "banlieues" around the French capital.
"Their technique is to pick up a young girl - normally a white girl - and once she has become the girlfriend of one of the members he will allow his mates to make use of her," said Sylvie Lotteau, a magistrate in the northern Paris suburb of Bobigny.
The extent of the phenomenon is hard to assess, mainly because the victims are reluctant to admit what happened for fear of reprisals or of being labelled promiscuous, while the perpetrators often fail to see the harm they have done, experts say.
"Their image of the girl is entirely negative. Often she'll be from a broken home, and they find it easy to say that of course she agreed to have sex with them," said Lotteau.
Eleven of the accused were minors - aged 17 or under - at the time of the rapes. The trial is being conducted behind closed doors and a verdict is due on September 27. - Sapa-AFP
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