Gisèle Pelicot has thanked supporters and said she never regretted the decision to make the trial public, after ex-husband Dominique Pelicot was jailed for 20 years for drugging her and recruiting strangers to rape her.
A court in Avignon on Thursday found Dominique Pelicot guilty for repeatedly drugging and raping Gisèle Pelicot for almost a decade, and inviting dozens of strangers to rape her unconscious body in their home.
Speaking outside the courthouse, Gisele Pelicot said she respected the court and its decision. She said the trial had been a “very difficult ordeal” but that she never regretted the decision to make the trial public.
She said that she was thinking of her three children and her grandchildren. “Because they are the future, it is also for them that I took on this battle.” She continued: “I’m also thinking of the many victims who are not recognised, whose stories often remain in the shadows. I want you to know that we share the same battle.
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“When I opened the doors to this trial on September 2nd, I wanted society to be able to take part in this debate. I have never regretted that decision. I have confidence in our ability to collectively grasp a future in which everyone, women and men alike, can live in harmony, with mutual respect and understanding.”
Her ex-husband has also been found guilty of making and distributing sexual images of his adult daughter Caroline and the wives of his sons.
The panel of five judges also found 50 other men on trial guilty. Most of the 50 other men accused alongside Dominique Pelicot had denied the charges.
Of the 51 men on trial, the French court found 47 of them guilty of rape, two guilty of attempted rape and two guilty of sexual assault. One man is on the run and being tried in his absence.
The verdict was read by the lead judge, Roger Arata. He read out verdicts one after the other against Dominique Pelicot and 50 other men, declaring “you are therefore declared guilty of aggravated rape on the person of Gisèle Pelicot” as he worked his way through the first names on the list.
Some of the sentences handed down by the panel of judges were lower than those that had been suggested by the state prosecutor.
Gisèle Pelicot, a 72-year-old retired logistics manager, looked on with her sons and daughter as the men’s sentences were read out by the head judge.
Dominique Pelicot, a retired electrician and former estate agent, was given the maximum sentence of 20 years for drugging and raping his then-wife and inviting men to rape her which she was in a comatose state.
The court heard that he crushed sleeping tablets and anti-anxiety medication into her mashed potato, coffee or ice-cream and invited dozens of men to rape her over a nine-year period from 2011 in the village of Mazan, Provence, where the couple had retired.
After videos of the rapes by him and other men were found meticulously categorised on his computer hard drive in a file labelled “abuse”, Dominique Pelicot admitted the charges in court, telling judges: “I am a rapist.”
He was also convicted of placing hidden cameras in bathrooms and bedrooms in his own home and that of his family to make and distribute naked images of his adult daughter and the wives of his sons.
Béatrice Zavarro, the lawyer for Dominique Pelicot, told reporters her client has 10 days to appeal against the sentence and is considering doing so. No decision has been taken yet on whether to appeal, the lawyer added.
Charly Arbo (30), a former vineyard worker who raped Gisèle Pelicot on six occasions, including on her 66th birthday when he was 24, was sentenced to 13 years in prison. Video evidence showed he also proposed drugging and raping his own mother with Dominique Pelicot, but he said he did not go through with it.
Romain Vandevelde (63), a former forklift driver who raped Gisèle Pelicot on six occasions over six months between 2019 and 2020, was sentenced to 15 years. He had known he was HIV positive at the time of the alleged rapes and had not worn a condom. His lawyer said that because he had been on HIV treatment since his diagnosis in 2004 he had an undetectable viral load and could not transmit the virus.
Cédric Grassot, a software technician who used to run a record shop in Avignon, was sentenced to 12 years for raping Gisèle Pelicot at her home in 2017. During the trial, he had turned to Gisèle Pelicot in court, and said: “I was your rapist. I was your torturer.”
Jean-Pierre Maréchal (63), a former lorry driver, was sentenced to 12 years for using the same technique to drug and rape his own wife, and organising for Pelicot to rape her with him.
The case has appalled the world and turned the victim, Gisèle Pelicot, into a symbol of courage and resilience.
She arrived in court on Thursday morning, ushered in by rousing applause and wearing a silk scarf, sent to her as a gesture of solidarity by an Australian organisation working to raise awareness of sexual assaults on older women.
Her ex-husband of 50 years had pleaded guilty to drugging her repeatedly for almost a decade to rape her, and to offer up her unconscious body for sex to dozens of strangers he had met online, while videoing the abuse.
Prosecutors had demanded the maximum 20-year prison sentence for him, and terms of between four to 18 years for the other 50 defendants, almost all of whom are accused of raping Gisèle Pelicot (72) while she lay comatose in her bed.
She waived her right to anonymity and asked for the trial to be held in public, with the videos aired in court, saying she hoped this would help other women speak up.
Ahead of the verdicts, the men charged alongside Dominique Pelicot were given the chance to make final statements on Monday. Around half of them simply said “nothing to add”. Around 15 of them asked Gisèle Pelicot for forgiveness.
The trial has triggered protest rallies around France in support of her, and spurred soul-searching, including a debate on whether to update France’s rape law, which at present makes no mention that sex should involve consent.
Many of the accused men have denied the charges, saying they thought it was a consensual sex game orchestrated by the couple and arguing that it was not rape if the husband approved.
Dominique Pelicot has denied misleading the men, saying they knew exactly what they were doing. “I am a rapist like the others in this room,” he said during testimony, apologising to his family and begging for forgiveness.
Gisèle Pelicot has sat resolutely throughout the three-month trial, staring down her abusers with steely determination and scoffing at any claim that she might have been a willing participant.
“I’ve decided not to be ashamed, I’ve done nothing wrong,” she told the court in the southern French city of Avignon in October. “They are the ones who must be ashamed,” she said.
The defendants come from all walks of life – lorry drivers, soldiers, firefighters, security guards, a supermarket worker, a journalist and the unemployed.
Most lived within a 50km (31-mile) radius of the Pelicots’ village of Mazan, which nestles in vineyards below Mont Ventoux.
The case only came to light in 2020, when Dominique Pelicot was caught trying to take photographs up the skirts of women in a supermarket. Police then discovered more than 20,000 photos and videos on his computer drives revealing the horrifying secrets that he had hidden from his now ex-wife for a decade.
Police believe 72 men had gone to the house to rape and abuse Gisèle Pelicot, but they were not able to identify them all.
Dominique Pelicot acknowledged that he had put powerful tranquillisers into his wife’s food and coffee that put her to sleep for hours. Gisèle Pelicot said she was worried she was developing Alzheimer’s or had a brain tumour because of the memory gaps.
She says she hopes the enormous interest in her case will help other women who have suffered sexual abuse, and brushes off praise for her own bravery in letting the world see her pain.
“It’s not courage. It’s determination to change things,” she told the court in October. “This is not just my battle, but that of all rape victims.” – Agencies