A trial is ongoing at the moment for French man Dominique Pelicot (71). Dominique is accused of drugging his now ex-wife Gisele (72) multiple times and allowing dozens of men into their home to rape her while she was drugged.
Dominique recorded over 20,000 videos of the rape acts. He has been dubbed the ‘Monster of Avignon.’
Gisele has been described as an ‘ordinary Frenchwoman.’ She is a wife and a mother to three adult children (a daughter and two sons) and was well known to her community in Avignon, France.
Neighbors said that the couple were ‘lovely people’ and they often held parties around their pool and in their ‘well kept garden.’
The family moved to Mazan from Paris around 1991.
Detectives have said that Gisele was raped a total of 92 times, committed by 72 men. 51 of the men have been identified and they are also on trial alongside Dominique.
Alleged rapists involved in the case include civil servants, ambulance workers, soldiers, prison guards, nurses, a journalist, a municipal councillor, and truck drivers.
When the trial began, Gisele waived her right to anonymity. “Proceedings will be public,” said the judge, who is president of a bench composed of five professional magistrates. Gisele’s lawyer, Antoine Camus, said: “She could have opted for a closed trial, but that’s what her attackers would have wanted.”
“I speak for all women who are drugged and don’t know about it, I do it on behalf of all women who will perhaps never know,” Gisèle said.
We have learned that between 2011 and 2020, Dominique is said to have used an online platform called coco.fr to find the men he invited to rape his wife.
Dominique allegedly advertised Gisele on a site for ‘partners’ on an online forum called ‘Without Her Knowing’.
Participants on the forum would talk about what acts they performed on their partners while they were unconscious. They would film their depravity, before storing the videos on a USB drive dubbed ‘Abuses’.
In this case, the data eventually fell into the hand of police, who confirmed it enabled them to identify the 92 cases of rape. Of the 83 men involved, 51 aged between 26 and 73 were identified and arrested by the police.
Dominique allegedly drugged Gisele by putting tablets of a powerful anxiolytic (anti anxiety) drug called Temesta/Lorazepam into her evening dinner.
The attackers were told they had to park at some distance from the house so as to not attract attention, and to wait for up to an hour so that the sleeping drugs which he had given Gisèle could take effect.
He then invited strangers from the online forum into the couple’s bedroom, so that his wife could be raped while unconscious. All were told to wash their hands, and not to wear aftershave, so she would not sense they were strangers.
Dominique was arrested in a supermarket in 2020. He had been filming up the skirts of customers. It is only due to this arrest that his crimes against Gisele were discovered. Police searched his phone and technology at his home and they found all of the details of the abuse.
Police also found naked photos of the couple’s daughter on Dominique’s computer.
A fireman who was accused of raping Gisele wore his uniform during the attack. When police searched this attacker’s computer, they found 728 images of children being sexually abused.
During the trial, some of the attackers have claimed that they did not know the sex was not consensual. One attacker denied it was rape and said ‘It’s his wife, he does what he likes with her.’
Gisele has also said that she knew one of her alleged rapists and would see him around the town. “I saw him now and then in the bakery, I would say hello, I never thought he’d come and rape me,” she said.
“For me, everything is falling apart. Everything I have built up over 50 years,” Gisele said in court. She also said ‘The police saved my life.’
Gisele has said that she had begun to believe she had Alzheimer’s after years of strange memory lapses and other health issues due to the alleged drugging.
“For me, everything collapses,” she testified. “These are scenes of barbarity, of rape.”
Police showed Gisele some of the images of herself being raped. “Frankly, these are scenes of horror for me,” she said.
“They treat me like a rag doll,” she told five judges, adding she had only been able to watch the video footage in May this year.
After learning of her husband’s crimes, she left their shared home with two suitcases, “all that was left for me of 50 years of life together.”
Since then, she said, “I no longer have an identity. … I don’t know if I’ll ever rebuild myself.”
Gisele told the court her daughter “screamed like a wild beast” when she heard the allegations.
“I will never forget this,” she said. “When I told my sons about this, I don’t think they really understood, they were withdrawn and didn’t react much. I think they were in a state of shock. They said don’t say such silly things.”
During the trial so far, lawyers for some of the attackers have tried to destroy Gisele’s credibility. The attorneys have questioned if the couple had an open relationship and if it was really plausible that Gisele had noticed nothing for the entire ten years of abuse.’’
“Don’t talk to me about sex scenes. These are rape scenes,” she said in court.
Gisele reiterated that she was ‘never complicit’ and never ‘pretended to be asleep’ during the rape attacks.
“I’m speaking for every woman who’s been drugged without knowing it,” she said.
“Many women don’t have the proof. I have the proof of what I’ve been through,” she said.
She also told the accused to “for once in your lives at least, take responsibility for your actions”.
“She knew nothing of what was inflicted on her. She had no memory of the rapes she suffered,” her lawyer Antoine Camus told France Bleu radio.
After learning of her husband’s crimes, she left their shared home with two suitcases, “all that was left for me of 50 years of life together.”
Since then, she said, “I no longer have an identity. … I don’t know if I’ll ever rebuild myself.”
“I feel disgusted,” she added.
“I’ve lost ten years of my life,” she said, adding that inside she was a “field of ruins”.
Gisele contracted four STD’s as a result of the assaults because the alleged rapists were not made to wear condoms.
“I have had no sympathy from any of the accused. One who was HIV-positive came six times. Not once did my husband express any concern about my health,” she said.
Gisele is in the process of divorcing Dominique.
“This is not easy and there is also the pressure from all of the individuals who are behind me. I can feel when there are questions that are trying to trap me so I am trying to answer as best I can and we will fight until the end, of course.”
Dominique was due to testify in court in early September 2024. This did not happen as he was too ill. He was taken from prison to hospital. His lawyer Beatrice Zavarro insisted his absence was not a ‘ploy’.
She said Dominique appeared to be suffering from renal colic, a painful condition which can be treated with keyhole surgery to remove blocked kidney stones. She added: ‘Let’s be clear about this. Monsieur Pelicot has not shirked [the proceedings] and will not be shirking.
‘He will be here. He will reply to all the questions, but he can’t control what happens to his body. He didn’t plan to be ill. He is not a robot.’
Before he fell ill, the court heard that Dominique first started drugging Gisele because she would not try swinging.
The trial will be ongoing until at least December 21, 2024 so we will come back with updates as they happen. This date may be pushed out if Dominique’s health does not improve rapidly.
Most of the suspects face up to 20 years in jail for aggravated rape if they are convicted.
Dominique was well enough to appear in court of the week beginning September 16, 2024. “I admit to the charges in their entirety” he said.
“I am a rapist just like all the others in this room … I ask my wife, my children, my grandchildren to accept my apologies. I regret what I did,” French media reported him as saying.
“I ask for your forgiveness, even if it is not forgivable.”
He told the courtroom he had had a difficult upbringing and had been a victim of rape himself.
“One is not born a pervert, one becomes a pervert,” he told judges, after recounting, sometimes in tears, being raped by a male nurse in hospital when he was nine years old and then being forced to take part in a gang rape at age 14.
Dominique also admitted to raping another woman while she was drugged. He apologised to this woman in court this week.
We have learned some more about how Dominique communicated with the would-be rapists.
He would tell men clearly in private messages online: “I’m looking for someone to abuse my wife asleep.” He wrote to one man online: “You’re like me, you like rape mode.”
Dominique also said that all the men knew they were being filmed while raping Gisele.
“Because there was a tripod and camera. Everyone could see it when they came in to the room.”
Dominique told the court that there was no way Gisele knew about the incidents. Asked if his wife could have consented, Dominique said “Not at all, it was always against her knowledge.” He said he drugged his wife two to three times a week, raping her each time himself.
He told the court that the assaults of his wife were an addiction. He said: “I had an addiction; I had needs. I put everything on the line without thinking. I was selfish and I’m ashamed.”
Dominique was asked about photos found on his hard drive of his adult daughter asleep in her underwear. He repeatedly said: “I never touched my daughter,” and denied taking photos of her. “You’re lying,” his daughter shouted in court. Last week, she told the court she believed her father had drugged her.
The court heard that he had allegedly filmed the wives of his two sons by placing a hidden camera in bathrooms they used.
SOURCE LIST
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-09-06/french-victim-of-drugging-and-sexual-assault-speaks-at-trial/104318494
https://www.vox.com/world-politics/370736/france-rape-case-gisele-dominique-pelicot-metoo
https://peoplesdispatch.org/2024/09/09/the-courage-of-gisele-pelicot/
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/sep/17/dominique-pelicot-france-rape-trial-testimony