Humiliations, bite marks, “coercive” control: the “chef to the stars” Jean Imbert will have to answer before an investigating judge for accusations of violence against his ex-partners, which could earn him indictment.
The Paris prosecutor’s office announced on Wednesday that it had opened a judicial investigation against the 45-year-old chef, one year after the first complaint against him and after two days in police custody.
The former winner of “Top Chef” 2012, who rose to the kitchens of the Plaza Athénée in Paris and the Martinez in Cannes, must be presented on Wednesday to a judge, who can indict him. He “disputes the criminal classification of the accused elements”, specified the prosecution.
At the start of his custody, his lawyers, Jacqueline Laffont and Julie Benedetti, told AFP that he answered “all the investigators’ questions” and that he had gone to his hearing “with numerous documents, pieces, and so many solid material elements which support his version of the facts.”
“Locked in a room”
Investigators interviewed six of his exes. “Each denounced violence, of different natures,” indicated the prosecution, with a “psychological impact” estimated between 25 and 30 days for each of them.
“Several of them mentioned elements constituting coercive control, such as control of their associations, their outings or their appearance. Confidants of the victims testified to traces of bites or bruises, humiliating behavior, even confinement in a room,” continued the prosecution.
He brought charges against two of them, for the most recent facts, between December 2023 and November 2024. They asked that their anonymity be respected.
The violence denounced by the four other women “appears prescribed”, according to the prosecution.
Broken nose
Holder of a Michelin star and fan of social networks, Jean Imbert regularly appeared alongside the stars frequenting his table, until the first accusations.
Among those who publicly accused him, the former Miss France Alexandra Rosenfeld, 39 years old. She announced in the spring that she had filed a complaint for facts dating back to their relationship, between 2012 and 2014.
She notably claims that Jean Imbert broke her nose during the filming of a cooking show they presented, “Recettes de fous” on M6.
Jean Imbert allegedly headbutted her after she received a message from her ex-husband about custody of their daughter. “He can’t stand that I had a life before. (For him), I act like a whore because I talk to my ex-husband,” she declared to “Complément d’Enquête”.
Jean Imbert had previously said he regretted “deeply the consequences” for the former Miss France, describing a relationship “unsustainable, marked by insults and crises”. His lawyers had mentioned mutual violence between them.
“Sequestrations”
The first woman to file a complaint, a year ago, for facts dating back to 2012-2013, actress Lila Salet, 35, denounced slapping, “always in an intimate setting, therefore without witnesses”.
She reported a “control”: “Every morning, I had to get up at the same time as him and I had to listen to him talking about himself in his bathtub (…). He couldn’t stand me going anywhere else alone,” she described at the time of her complaint.
She also denounced being held captive “for several hours” in a hotel, during the couple’s weekend in Florence, because of a text message she received from a friend. “He hit me several times in the face and poured champagne in my eyes (…). He didn’t want me to leave my hotel room anymore.
The cook’s lawyers had refuted any “sequestration” during this Italian weekend.
In mid-April, the management of the Plaza Athénée noted the withdrawal of Jean Imbert from his managerial and executive functions in his restaurant, while confirming the continuation of his collaboration as “artistic director” until the end of his contract in June.
