Elon Musk fails to appear for questioning by French police over sexualized AI images on X

Elon Musk failed to appear Monday for police questioning in a French criminal investigation into X, the Paris prosecutor's office confirmed while saying his absence would not halt the case.

Musk, the billionaire owner of X, and the company's chief executive Linda Yaccarino had both been summoned for voluntary interviews with police on April 20 in Paris, prosecutors said.

The summons had been issued after French gendarmes and Europol raided X's Paris offices in February over allegations the platform was producing and distributing child sexual abuse material.

Prosecutors said the investigation was being conducted "in a constructive manner," with the aim of bringing X into compliance with French law rather than simply pursuing punishment.

The voluntary hearings were designed to let Musk and Yaccarino present their positions and outline any compliance steps they planned to take. Other X employees have also been called to appear as witnesses this week.

Prosecutors also pushed back on a report in The Wall Street Journal that the U.S. Department of Justice had declined to assist the French investigation on the grounds the investigation was an attempt to impose political punishments on an American company.

“It is important to remember that the French constitution guarantees the separation of powers and the independence of the judiciary,” prosecutors said. “Criminal investigations are conducted solely under the authority of magistrates.”

The prosecutors confirmed that materials from the French case had been shared with the DOJ and state-level prosecutors in California and New York, as well as with European prosecutors' offices. 

Officials in the United States, United Kingdom and European Union have also criticised X after the platform’s artificial intelligence tool Grok was used to create sexual images of non-consenting people, including children, in response to user requests.