Swedish cultural icon Jean-Claude Arnault, central figure in Nobel sex scandal, convicted of rape

(Image credit: Jonathan Nackstrand/AFP/Getty Images)

On Monday, right before the Nobel Prize in Medicine was awarded, a court in Stockholm unanimously sentenced Jean-Claude Arnault, a central player in Sweden's Nobel community, to two years in prison for a 2011 rape. The Swedish Academy, which awards the Nobel Prize in Literature, announced in May that it will not award the literature Nobel this year, citing the Arnault scandal. "The court's conclusion is that the evidence is enough to find the defendant guilty of one of the events," Judge Gudrun Antemar said Monday, adding that the evidence "has mainly consisted of statements made during the trial by the injured party and several witnesses."

Arnault, who is French, is a major cultural figure in Sweden, and his wife, poet Katarina Frostenson, is a suspended member of the Swedish Academy. He had faced two counts of rape.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.