🔗 Share this article

Gisèle Pelicot, who survived nearly a ten years of sexual assaults by scores of men after being incapacitated by her ex-husband, is set to appear court in France once more this Monday. This follows one of the men convicted of raping her filed an appeal, triggering a new hearing.

Pelicot emerged as a feminist icon after opting to forgo her right to privacy during the 2024 trial involving her ex-husband and 50 other men. Her lawyer, Antoine Camus, explained that while she would have rather avoided the stress of another trial, she will be in attendance throughout the four-day appeal at the Nîmes court in southern France.

“Her presence is essential to explain that a rape is a rape, that there is no such thing as a small rape,” Camus informed the press.

Husamettin Dogan, a 44-year-old builder sentenced to nine years in prison for raping Pelicot, has challenged his conviction. The first trial revealed that Dogan reached out to her then-husband through a online forum and drove to their home the same night in June 2019, informing his own wife he was leaving. He was found guilty of raping Gisèle Pelicot while she was unconscious.

Dogan asserted during the first trial that he believed it was a form of role-play. “I am not a criminal, that’s too difficult for me to accept,” he said. His legal representative refused to comment before the appeal.

Initially, 17 of the 51 convicted men signaled they would appeal, but 16 withdrew over time, leaving only one appeal proceeding.

Dominique Pelicot, described as one of the most notorious sex offenders in recent French memory, was sentenced 20 years in prison for administering drugs to his then-wife and arranging for multiple men to rape her at their home in southern France over nearly a decade of marriage.

Testimony in last year’s trial revealed that Dominique Pelicot had mixed sleeping pills and anti-anxiety medication into his wife’s food or drinks, then brought in men to assault her in the village of Mazan in the French countryside. A total of 50 other men were found guilty in the case.

Now in a prison sentence in isolation, Dominique Pelicot is scheduled to appear as a witness at the appeal. He is expected to restate his earlier testimony: “I am a rapist and all the charged men in this room are rapists.”

Gisèle Pelicot, a 72-year-old former logistics manager, had demanded that the first trial be held in open court to raise awareness about assault under sedation. “We should not feel ashamed, it’s for them,” she stated in court.

The case generated a significant impact globally, with feminist organizations across all continents backing Gisèle Pelicot and world leaders issuing statements in her support.

However, campaigners and attorneys noted that the case highlighted how widespread and commonplace rape and sexual violence remains.

In a separate case, a 46-year-old man in Normandy was sentenced 12 years in prison for raping his partner while she was unconscious on multiple instances in 2022. Similar to Dominique Pelicot, he first came to police attention for filming up a woman’s skirt in a supermarket, and investigators later discovered videos of the assaults on his digital equipment.

The appeal in the Pelicot case takes place amid growing criticism of the French justice system’s handling of rape. Several damning reports since the first trial have shown that the system continues to fail rape complainants on a significant level.

This year, the European Court of Human Rights censured France for “not safeguarding” the rights of three teenagers who disclosed rape.

One teenager who accused several firefighters of abuse was found to have suffered “re-traumatization and discriminatory treatment” by the French justice system, which did not act to protect her dignity “by permitting the use of judgmental and guilt-inducing statements, which propagated gender stereotypes.”

In another instance, France was found to have breached the European Convention on Human Rights in the case of a hospital pharmacist who filed a rape complaint against her supervisor.

This month, the High Council for Equality, an advisory body associated with the French prime minister’s office, found that despite a threefold increase in rape complaints in France since the global #MeToo movement in 2016, the number of cases reaching court remains dangerously low, with only 3.3% of complaints leading to convictions.

More than 130 feminist groups are advocating for comprehensive changes at every level of the French justice system in dealing with rape, calling for major funding increases and improved state support and prevention.

“This legal battle was a form of electric shock, it enabled a lot of people to talk about rape and spousal assault. However, there has not really been a political response. There is a great deal missing in France, and serious dysfunction [in the justice system],” said Anne-Cécile Mailfert of the Fondation des Femmes.

Separately, parliament is currently considering adding a clear legal standard of rape into French law.

Marie-Charlotte Garin, a Green MP who supports rewording the law, stated that the Pelicot case had altered French society’s understanding of consent and that updating the legal wording would help “a societal shift to move from a culture of rape to a respect for autonomy.”

However, Garin stressed that wording alone is insufficient to address persistent “failures” of the entire French state toward rape survivors. “We need a overhaul in the system to improve how we handle rape,” she said.