The French are in shock after the devastating testimony of Angelique Cauchy, the former tennis star who was sexually abused by her coach Andrew Geddes when she was just 12 years old. The coach had already been sentenced to 18 years in prison, but this week the former tennis player testified before a commission of inquiry looking for shortcomings in the country’s federations after new episodes of abuse and sexual assault were revealed.
“In two years, my trainer raped me almost 400 times,” Cauchy said, recalling his 15-day internship at La Baule. “I lived through the worst weeks of my life, he raped me three times a day. The first night he asked me to go to his room, but I didn’t go. Then he came to me. It was even worse. I was trapped, I couldn’t leave when I wanted to.”
The former player, who was just a child at the time, remembers the fear she felt. “I was separated from his room by 13 steps…”
“He started by verbally attacking me. I tried to protect myself and asked him to stop, repeating day after day: “Don’t touch me, this is wrong, I don’t want to.” But he replied: “Don’t touch me.” Don’t worry, this happens often between coaches and students. But I didn’t want to, he was the same age as my mother…” he continued.
The former tennis player, now 36, remembers Andrew Gooddes telling her he had AIDS. “I lived between the ages of 13 and 18 thinking I had AIDS. I often thought about suicide, he raped me three times a day! I lived through a nightmare that ruined my career.”
Cauchy insists that the tennis players knew what was happening. “It was known in the tennis world that he was wrong with girls. Sometimes they told me: “Yes, he is with this one or met with that one.” But at 38 you don’t date a girl. A 15-year-old girl, especially with a guitar! The woman reported this to the club president, to which he replied: “Yes, but he brings us titles.”