A woman holds a a rape protest sign in the street. Photo available via CC BY 4.0.
On September 2, 2024, Gièsle Pelicot’s trial began, in which she accused her ex-husband of 50 years, Dominique Pelicot, of drugging her and inviting men to their house to sexually assault. She was unaware of these happeneings for almost 10 years.
On October 4, 2024, Dominique’s videos of Gisèle’s rape became public in the trial. While watching these videos, Dominique looked at the floor and covered his eyes while other defendants watched themselves or looked away. Due to the overwhelming evidence, Dominique said, “I am a rapist like the others in this room.”
The Perpetrators and Their Crimes
50 suspects out of the 83 in the husband’s videos are identified, their ages ranging from 26 to 68. Many have admirable jobs like pharmacists, laborers, journalists and many are husbands and fathers. So far, 15 men have admitted to rape while the others admitted to only taking part in sexual acts.
Gisèle was not the only person to experience assault from Dominique. In her book, “And I Stopped Calling you Papa,” their daughter, Caroline Darian, (this is a pen name), wrote about her experience as the daughter of a victim and perpetrator. In the book, she claims men took pictures of her sleeping in lingerie. The book also discusses when Darian confronted her dad about everything, he did not show remorse but rather seemed relieved and glad it was all done with.
This book explores the effect of the sleep drugs on Gisèle, saying that she always seemed incoherent and forgetful, not being able to remember things like vacations and car rides. When she went to the doctor, they told her it was probably because of stress, and to just try to relax. It turned out that these health problems are because Dominique dosed her with Lorazepam, which is for treating used to treat anxiety and Ambien, which is for insomnia. If someone ingests too much without needing them, like Gisèle did, they cause liver, heart, kidney and cognitive diseases. This means that the type of rape she experienced chemical submission.
The Process of Abuse
Drugging his wife was just the start of Dominique’s process of raping her. It started with inviting people from the internet to their house, using a website called ‘Without them Knowing”. These people would have to follow Dominique’s rules to prevent Gisèle from waking up. They would have to not wear cologne, not smoke, their hands must have been body temperature, they had to park far away and they had to be fully nude when they enter Gisèle’s bedroom so if she woke up they wouldn’t have to try to dig around for their clothes in the dark. Dominique would film these rape scenes and post them online. This happened from July 2011 until October 2020.
French authorities originally arrested Dominique for filming videos up girls’ skirts in October 2020. The police took custody of his phone and found hundreds of photos and videos of his wife naked or in lingerie, with naked men standing above her. Additionally, the police found videos that Dominique had taken of his daughters-in-law through a hidden camera in their bathrooms.
The Defense
The defense of many defendants is that they didn’t know they were raping Gisèle because they thought they had consent. They either argue that since Gisèle’s husband gave consent, it is okay, or that Gisèle was pretending to be asleep and it was a sexual game she enjoys. In French law, rape is defined as sexual penetration obtained by constraint, violence or surprise. Many protesters are trying to get the definition changed so it says that consent is needed by all parties.
Thousands of French people held rallies supporting Gisele. More concern spread due to the amount of men that knew about the rape, but did not do anything.
“One hundred percent of these people… never made a phone call to stop this abuse,” says Céline Piques, of the feminist organization, Osez le Féminisme.
The trial is may last until December 20, 2024, where Dominique and other defendants will likely face the punishment of sexual assault, which, in France, is 20 years.
