On the benches of the plaintiffs at the criminal court in Vannes, a young woman waited her turn. A civil servant in her 30s, discreet, she appeared to be almost surprised to be there, having not intended to testify just a few weeks ago. To be publicly known as a victim of Joël Le Scouarnec, the former surgeon on trial since February 24 for rapes and sexual assaults against 299 patients, mostly minors at the time? Unthinkable. Could she expose her private life so publicly, she wondered. How would her neighbors, family and friends view her back home in Vannes?

At the start of the hearings, she overheard people at the market discussing the trial, each calculating their age when the former doctor practiced in the region between 1994 and 2007, to determine if they had been treated by him. "Phew, I wasn't there!" a trader sighed. "Me neither," "nor was I," echoed others around, relieved. The civil servant walked away with her head down. She wanted to be angry. But she was overcome by a single emotion: shame and the pain of shame.

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