Dominique Pelicot has been found guilty and sentenced to 20 years in prison for drugging his ex-wife, Gisèle, raping her and inviting dozens of men to also abuse her over nearly a decade, along with other charges.
Pelicot had admitted the charges against him.
He was on trial with 50 other men, the majority of whom denied charges of rape. The court in the French city of Avignon found 47 of the men guilty of rape, two guilty of attempted rape, and two guilty of sexual assault.
The defendants now have 10 days to appeal.
Most of the 50 come from towns and villages in a 50km (30 mile) radius of the Pelicots’ own village of Mazan.
Among them are firefighters, lorry drivers, soldiers, security guards, a journalist and a DJ.
They were nicknamed “Mr Everyman” by the French press, and for more than a decade these men crept into Gisele Pelicot’s bedroom and raped her while she lay unconscious, drugged by the man she trusted most in the world.
Most lived within a 35-mile radius of Dominique Pelicot and his wife – some were even known to Gisele.
For ten years, Dominique Pelicot, 72, repeatedly sedated his wife and invited strangers to abuse her, advertising on a French swinging website.
Some denied the rape charges, claiming they believed Ms Pelicot had agreed to be drugged and was a willing participant in a sex game between the couple.
But all of the men were found guilty of at least one offence, with nearly all convicted of rape, after a trial that shocked France and made headlines around the world. Gisele insisted it be held in public, telling the court: “It is not for us to be ashamed, but for those men.”
Dominique has been sentenced to 20 years in prison, with his daughter telling him during the trial he will “die alone like a dog in jail”.
The other 50 men sentenced to more than 400 collective years in prison were given sentences generally lower than what the prosecution had asked for. Five of them received a suspended sentence and walked free from court. The rest have 10 days to appeal.
For almost a decade, Gisèle Pelicot was unknowingly given sedatives by her ex-husband, who has admitted to raping her and inviting men he had recruited online to have sex with her in her bed at home while she was unconscious and unaware.
Although Dominique Pelicot admitted the charges against him, most of the other men on trial denied what they did was rape.
It was Gisèle’s decision to waive her anonymity and throw this trial into the open – in her words, making “shame swap sides” from the victim to the rapist – something which has turned the 72-year-old into a feminist icon.
Campaigners said this case proved the need for consent to be built into France’s rape laws, as in other European countries.
What is the case all about?
From 2011 to 2020, Dominique Pelicot plied his wife with tranquilising drugs and sleeping pills without her knowledge, crushed them into powder and added them to her food and drink.
Gisèle Pelicot suffered memory loss and blackouts because of the drugs and she has spoken of 10 years of her life that have been lost.
He was eventually caught because a security guard reported him to police for taking photographs under women’s skirts in a supermarket.
“I thought we were a close couple,” she once told the court. Instead, her husband was going on a notorious but now banned website called Coco.fr to invite local men to their home to have sex with her while she was comatose.
“I was sacrificed on the altar of vice,” Gisèle Pelicot said early in the trial.
Since the start of September, Judge Roger Arata and his four colleagues have heard how 50 men, now aged between 27 and 74, visited the Pelicots’ home in the village of Mazan.
What makes this case unusual?
Not only has this case been held in full view of the public, but the evidence against all the accused was recorded on video by Dominique Pelicot at the time and then played out in court.
Gisèle Pelicot, who has divorced her husband, said the men “treated me like a rag doll”. “Don’t talk to me about sex scenes. These are rape scenes,” she said.
Therefore none of those accused has been able to challenge the allegation that they were in Gisèle Pelicot’s room while she was comatose.
Their defence relied on the definition of rape, because it currently involves any kind of sexual penetration “by violence, coercion, threat, or surprise”. That means prosecutors needed to prove intent to rape.
Public prosecutor Laure Chabaud told the court that no-one could say any more that “since she didn’t say anything, she gave her consent – that belongs to a bygone age”.
Thousands of people have joined protests in support of Gisèle Pelicot in France. Women have stood outside the court every day chanting one of the phrases her lawyers said in court: “Shame is changing sides.”
As she arrived at court in Avignon on Thursday morning, she was met by a cheering crowd of supporters and international media. Her supporters remained outside after the verdicts were read – singing “from the women of all the world, we thank you”.
Why has Gisèle Pelicot become so important?
Gisèle Pelicot has attended almost every day of the trial, appearing at the court in her sunglasses just before nine o’clock.
Her decision to waive her anonymity is highly unusual, but she has stood firm at every moment. “I want all women who have been raped to say: Madame Pelicot did it, I can too.”
But she has been clear that behind her facade of strength “lies a field of ruins” and despite the widespread acclaim for what she has done, she is a reluctant hero.
“She keeps repeating, ‘I am normal,’ she does not want to be considered as an icon,” her lawyer Stéphane Babonneau has told the BBC’s Emma Barnett.
“Women generally have a strength in them that they can’t even imagine and that they have to trust themselves. That’s her message.”
How this case has shaken France
Lawyers for the 51 defendants highlighted the ordinary lives they led, although a court-appointed psychiatrist Laurent Layet testified that they were neither ordinary nor “monsters”.
In the early weeks of the trial, the mayor of the village of Mazan told the BBC that the case could have been far more serious as nobody died.
But those remarks provoked an outcry across France and the mayor quickly apologised. He has since said he is withdrawing from public life.
The fact the trial was held in public meant every session was reported at length and in detail.
Elsa Labouret of activist group Dare to be Feminist told the BBC: “[Gisèle Pelicot] decided to make this bigger than herself. To make this about the way we, as a society, treat sexual violence.”
Here is a list of the men convicted:
- Dominique Pelicot: Guilty of aggravated rape on his ex-wife, Gisèle. Also guilty of the attempted aggravated rape of the wife of one of the co-accused Jean-Pierre Marechal, Cillia, and taking indecent images of his daughter, Caroline, and his daughters-in-law, Aurore and Celine. Sentenced to 20 years. He is 72.
- Jean-Pierre Marechal: Guilty of attempted rape and aggravated rape of his wife, as well as drugging her. Sentenced to 12 years. The only one of the 51 who was not accused of raping or attempting to rape Gisèle, the 63-year-old admitted to following Dominique Pelicot’s lead, drugging his own wife for five years, raping her and inviting Dominique to rape her too.
- Charly Arbo: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 13 years. He is 30 years old.
- Cyrille Delville: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. He is a father-of-two.
- Christian Lescole: Guilty of aggravated rape. Acquitted of having child abuse imagery. Sentenced to nine years. He is a volunteer firefighter and father of two daughters. He has been in jail since 2021.
- Lionel Rodriguez: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. The 44-year-old was an employee in the same supermarket where Dominique Pelicot got caught upskirting in 2020, leading to the rape investigation.
- Nicolas Francois: Guilty of aggravated rape and having child abuse imagery. Sentenced to eight years and banned from working in jobs with children for several years. He is a 43-year-old freelance journalist.
- Jacques Cubeau, 73, lorry driver: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to five years. He is a divorced father-of-two.
- Patrice Nicolle: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. The 55-year-old father-of-two is an electrician.
- Thierry Parisis: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. He is 54.
- Simoné Mekenese: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to nine years. The 43-year-old construction worker and father-of-six lived next door to the Pelicots.
- Nizar Hamida: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 10 years. The 40-year-old had worked as a hairdresser, builder and delivery driver.
- Boris Moulin: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. He is a 37-year-old delivery driver.
- Jerome Vilela: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 13 years. The 46-year-old former firefighter and supermarket employee is divorced with two children. He has been in jail since 2021.
- Didier Sambuchi: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to five years. The 68-year-old is a retired lorry driver and father-of-two.
- Quentin Hennebert: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to seven years. The 34-year-old former prison guard now works as an ambulance driver.
- Philippe Leleu: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to five years of which two are suspended. He is a 62-year-old gardener.
- Jean-Luc LA: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 10 years. The 46-year-old has four children. He has been in jail since 2023.
- Fabien Sotton: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 11 years. He has three children. His criminal record includes domestic violence and sexual assault of a minor. He has been in jail since 2021.
- Karim Sebaoui: Guilty of aggravated rape and having child abuse imagery. Sentenced to 10 years. The 40-year-old is an unmarried IT specialist.
- Joan Kawai: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 10 years. He went to the Pelicots’ the same night his daughter was born. He has been in jail since 2021.
- Jean-Marc LeLoup: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to six years. The 74-year-old is a retired driver.
- Andy Rodriguez: Guilty of attempted rape and aggravating factors. Sentenced to six years. The 37-year-old has already spent several months in jail on domestic violence charges.
- Vincent Coullet: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 10 years. He is 43 years old and already detained for domestic violence.
- Adrien Longeron: Guilty of aggravated rape and child abuse imagery. Sentenced to six years. The 34-year-old was jailed in 2020 for raping and stalking three former girlfriends.
- Hughes Malago: Guilty of attempted rape and two aggravating factors. Sentenced to five years. The 39-year-old is a tiler and biker.
- Ahmed Tbarik: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. The 54-year-old plumber who set up his own business, as well as a boxing club, had been married for 30 years when he went to the Pelicots’ home.
- Husamettin Dogan: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to nine years. The 43-year-old builder is married and has a child. He had precedents for drug trafficking.
- Romain Vandevelde: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 15 years. He is 63 and HIV-positive. He has been in jail since 2021.
- Joseph Cocco: Guilty of aggravated sexual assault. Sentenced to three years. He is a 69-year-old divorced father of one.
- Saifeddine Ghabi: Acquitted of rape and attempted rape. Guilty of sexual assault. Sentenced to three years. The 37-year-old lorry driver is a father-of-three.
- Jean Tirano: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. He is a 52-year-old roofer.
- Mohamed Rafaa: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. The 70-year-old worked as a DJ and club manager. He has been in jail since 2021.
- Ludovick Blemeur: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to seven years. The 39-year-old former firefighter and warehouse worker had a three-month-old baby daughter when he visited the Pelicots.
- Patrick Aron: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to six years, but walks free today as he has medical issues and will need to be placed in a special jail, according to the judge. The 60-year-old was married for 25 years with two kids.
- Abdelali Dallal: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years, but walks free today due to medical issues and will need to be placed in a special jail, according to the judge. He is 47.
- Grégory Serviol: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. The 33-year-old is a painter and decorator.
- Cedric Grassot: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 12 years. The 50-year-old is a delivery driver.
- Cendric Venzin: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to nine years. The 44-year-old worked a series of odd jobs and at the time he was arrested in 2022 was managing a hotel in Corsica.
- Mahdi Daoudi: Guilty of mass rape and drugging. Sentenced to eight years. The 36-year-old is married.
- Thierry Postat: Guilty of aggravated mass rape and drugging, and possession of child pornography. Sentenced to 12 years, and banned from working with children for life. The 61-year-old refrigeration specialist is divorced with three grown children. He has been in jail since 2021.
- Florian Rocca: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to seven years. The father of three daughters was already convicted of theft, driving without a license and drug-related offences.
- Dominique Davies: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 13 years. The 45-year-old is a lorry driver.
- Cyprien Culieras: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to six years. He is 45 and has eight prior convictions.
- Mathieu Dartus: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to seven years. The 53-year-old former baker raised two children after his wife died.
- Cyril Beaubis: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to nine years. The 47-year-old is a lorry driver.
- Paul-Koikoi Grovogui: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. He is 31.
- Omar Douiri: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years. The 36-year-old was married and employed by a cleaning company.
- Redouane Azougagh: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to nine years. The 40-year-old father of four kids from two different wives has prior convictions for domestic violence.
- Hassan Ouamou: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to 12 years. The 30-year-old is currently on the run in Morocco and has told investigators he has no intention of returning to France.
- Redouane El Farihi: Guilty of aggravated rape. Sentenced to eight years.
Some of them have apologised for their behaviour, but many have not. The average jail term for rape in France is 11.1 years, according to the French justice ministry.
Source: bbc.co.uk
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