Entertainment News | Reports: Paul Haggis Detained in Italy in Sex Assault Case
Get latest articles and stories on Entertainment at LatestLY. Film director Paul Haggis was detained on Sunday for investigation of allegations that he sexually assaulted a woman in southern Italy, Italian news media said, quoting local prosecutors.
Rome, Jun 19 (AP) Film director Paul Haggis was detained on Sunday for investigation of allegations that he sexually assaulted a woman in southern Italy, Italian news media said, quoting local prosecutors.
The Canadian-born, Oscar-winning Haggis, 69, has been in Italy for a film festival that begins on Tuesday in Ostuni, a tourist town in Puglia, the region that forms the “heel” of the Italian peninsula.
The news agency LaPresse and several other Italian media carried a written statement from prosecutors in the nearby city of Brindisi that they were investigating allegations a “young foreign woman” was forced to have “non-consensual” sexual relations over two days.
Prosecutors Antonio Negro and Livia Orlando, who are conducting the investigation, said in the statement that the woman was “forced to seek medical care" following the sexual relations.
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After a couple of days “of non-consensual relations, the woman was accompanied by the man” to Brindisi airport on Sunday and “was left there at dawn despite (her) precarious physical and psychological conditions.”
The Brindisi prosecutors' office was closed on Sunday. Haggis's attorney didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
The prosecutors said airport staff and police noticed her “obvious confused state” and " and after lending initial treatment, took her to Brindisi's police headquarters, where officers accompanied her to a local hospital for examination.
Police at headquarters' operations room said they weren't authorized to give out information about the case, including whether Haggis was being held at the police station or at a hotel or other lodging.
Haggis is a director, producer and screenwriter. He won an Oscar in 2006 for best original screenplay for "Crash."
Prosecutors also were quoted as saying that the woman “formalized her complaint and cited circumstances which were subsequently looked into for confirmation by investigators.” They didn't cite her nationality or age. (AP)
(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)