PARIS (AP) \u2014 The death of a French streamer during an extended broadcast prompted soul-searching and controversy, as a government minister said he had been \u201chumiliated and mistreated for months\u201d on air and a judicial investigation delves into alleged abuse.<\/p>\n
Rapha\u00ebl Graven, 46, known as Jean Pormanove on social media, died Monday in southern France during a broadcast on the Kick livestreaming platform that had been running for more than 298 hours. French media reported the broadcast was interrupted soon after Pormanove\u2019s co-streamers found him unconscious and lying on a bed. <\/p>\n
The prosecutor in the southern French city of Nice, Damien Martinelli, said an autopsy was being carried out on Thursday to determine the causes of the death.<\/p>\n
A judicial investigation underway<\/p>\n
Pormanove\u2019s death came as a judicial investigation was already underway into alleged violence and humiliations committed against him, prompted by reports from French investigative website Mediapart about what it described as the \u201conline abuse business.\u201d Mediapart said co-streamers were allegedly mistreating Pormanove in live broadcasts, sometimes encouraged by payments from viewers, to generate more subscriptions and money.<\/p>\n
The investigation opened in December is looking into \u201cdeliberate violence against vulnerable persons\u201d and \u201cspreading recordings of images related to offenses involving deliberate violations of physical integrity,\u201d the Nice prosecutor\u2019s statement said. It did not specify why Pormanove could be considered vulnerable.<\/p>\n
The statement said two co-streamers allegedly involved in the case were briefly taken into custody in January but were released pending further investigation.<\/p>\n
In parallel, the Nice prosecutor said, investigators interviewed Pormanove and one of his co-streamers who both appeared to be victims of violence and humiliation. They \u201cstrongly denied being victims of violence, stating that the events were staged in order to \u2018generate a buzz\u2019 and make money,\u201d the statement said.<\/p>\n
Co-streamers banned from the platform<\/p>\n
Pormanove\u2019s death prompted strong reactions on social media as many users questioned the authorities\u2019 failure to act.<\/p>\n
Clara Chappaz, Minister of Digital Affairs, said on X that Pormanove\u2019s death was \u201cabsolutely horrific\u201d and she had contacted the platform\u2019s managers for an explanation. <\/p>\n
\u201cJean Pormanove was humiliated and mistreated for months live on the Kick platform,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Kick said all Pormanove\u2019s co-streamers who participated in the broadcast have been banned pending the outcome of the investigation.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are deeply saddened by the passing of Jean Pormanove and extend our sincere condolences to his family, friends, and community,\u201d Kick said in a statement released on X. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe are committed to cooperating fully with the authorities in this process,\u201d the statement said. \u201cWe are undertaking a comprehensive review of our French-language content.\u201d<\/p>\n
Over one million followers<\/p>\n
According to French media reports, Pormanove was used to take part to so-called \u201cmarathon\u201d events on air for an extended period of time, with incentives for viewers to subscribe or make donations. He accumulated over one million followers on several video platforms, including over 192,000 on Kick.<\/p>\n
An Australian company, Kick is a video streaming platform similar to Amazon\u2019s Twitch, but with a much more permissive moderation policy that allows gambling activities, sexually suggestive content or content involving humiliation or violence to be broadcast without automatic sanctions \u2014 attracting influencers banned from other platforms.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll platforms have a legal responsibility to remove obvious illegal content of which they are aware,\u201d Chappaz said. <\/p>\n
Mediapart reported that a few hours before he died, Pormanove was the victim of abuse as some co-streamers slapped him and punched him several times. <\/p>\n
Martinelli, the prosecutor, said investigators conducted several interviews with people who were present at the time of death and a large amount of material and video footage have also been seized.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PARIS (AP) \u2014 The death of a French streamer during an extended broadcast prompted soul-searching and controversy, as…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3183,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[8293,4219,94649,156,57,86,4221,94647,50,30629,80,94648,158,103,107],"class_list":{"0":"post-163999","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-clara-chappaz","9":"tag-crime","10":"tag-damien-martinelli","11":"tag-france","12":"tag-general-news","13":"tag-government-policy","14":"tag-homicide","15":"tag-jean-pormanove","16":"tag-news","17":"tag-nice","18":"tag-politics","19":"tag-raphal-graven","20":"tag-technology","21":"tag-world","22":"tag-world-news"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115067279475325779","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=163999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=163999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=163999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=163999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}