Star photographer vows to sue after child models allege rape
Rapist can sleep soundly
Hamilton accused the media of "presenting these accusations like the truth. I was accused several years ago and cleared. I am innocent and should be considered so," he added in a statement.
The photographer also turned on Flament, accusing her of slander.
"Clearly the instigator of this media lynching is looking for her 15 minutes of fame by defaming me in her novel.
"I will take several legal actions in the coming days and it will be for the courts to condemn those responsible for this defamation," he said.
Hamilton, who has said that his work looks for the "candour of a lost paradise", is most famous for his kitschy calendars of young girls and his soft-focus erotic films including "Bilitis".
However, a British man was convicted in 2005 of having indecent images of children that included books by Hamilton after prosecutors argued that some of the pictures were "plainly indecent".
Flament said she had been afraid to bring charges earlier.
Under the French statute of limitations, charges must be brought within 20 years for rape and 10 years for sexual abuse.
"I wasn't allowed to say his name in my work because the law as it stands doubly condemns rape victims," she told L'Obs weekly.
"You go from victim to being guilty of defamation" by mentioning what happened, she said. "You don't sleep but your rapist can sleep soundly" knowing they can't be touched by the law.
Flament said Hamilton raped her in the shower of his apartment afterspotting her in a nudist resort at Cap d'Agde in southwest France where she was on holiday with her parents.
The case has reopened the debate on the statute of limitations in France, particularly concerning sex crimes against children.
In a new twist Tuesday, the French minister for children's and women's rights asked Flament to head a body which will look at whether to extend the statute of limitations.
Laurence Rossignol said Flament was a "victim but also an expert on this subject".
Last month the junior minister in charge of victims of crime or terror, Juliette Meadel, said the law "had to be rethought and worked on".
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