A 71-year-old French man admitted in court docket on Tuesday (17 September 2024) that for practically a decade he repeatedly drugged his unconscious spouse and invited dozens of males to rape her as she lay unconscious of their mattress.
His spouse, to whom he has been married for 50 years and who has divorced him since his arrest, additionally spoke out, telling the court docket she feels utterly betrayed.
In a trial that shocked France and raised consciousness about sexual violence at residence and overseas, Dominique Pélicot informed the court docket he additionally raped his spouse and that the 50 males on trial alongside him understood precisely what they have been doing.
“At present I keep that, like the opposite males right here, I’m a rapist,” declared Dominique Pélicot. “They knew every part. They can not say in any other case.”
Pélicot’s testimony marked crucial second in a trial that has shocked the world. Though he had already confessed his crimes to investigators, his testimony in court docket will probably be essential to the panel of judges deciding the destiny of the opposite defendants, whose ages vary from 26 to 74. A lot of them deny raping the sufferer, saying they have been manipulated by her then-husband or that they believed she was consenting.
A lot of these following the case additionally hope that her testimony will assist clarify why Dominique Pélicot subjected the mom of his three youngsters to such unacceptable abuse.
The sufferer has grow to be a heroine to many rape victims and an emblem of the struggle towards sexual violence in France for agreeing to waive her anonymity within the case, enable the trial to be public and seem brazenly earlier than the media. She reveals up each day, strolling via the court docket’s safety line behind the boys accused of raping her. As she left the court docket throughout a break on Tuesday, supporters introduced her flowers.
After a number of days of delays because of what his legal professionals say was a kidney stone and a urinary tract an infection, Dominique Pélicot, sitting in a wheelchair, testified that the fees towards him are true. Together with his ex-wife watching from the packed courtroom, his voice shaking and barely audible at instances, he started an extended day of testimony attempting to elucidate the childhood traumas that he says scarred and formed him into the individual he turned.
“One shouldn’t be born a pervert, one turns into a pervert,” Pélicot informed the judges after recounting, generally in tears, how she was raped by a hospital nurse when she was 9 years outdated and the way she was pressured to take part in a gang rape when she was 14.
Pélicot additionally mentioned that for years his father sexually abused a younger woman his household had taken in and that his brother later mentioned their father had invited different males to do the identical.
He regretted that his mother and father didn’t enable him to proceed his research after he turned 14. He mentioned that at the moment he tried to persuade his mom to depart residence with him, however “she by no means wished to.”
“I do not wish to discuss it, I am simply ashamed of my father. Ultimately, I did not do something higher,” mentioned Pélicot, who faces as much as 20 years in jail if convicted.
After talking about her troublesome childhood, the sufferer was given the chance to handle the court docket.
“It is extremely laborious for me to listen to this. I lived with a person for 50 years. I couldn’t think about for a second that he might have dedicated rape,” she mentioned. “I trusted this man utterly.”
The 2 checked out one another, he from behind the glass window of the dock and she or he from the witness stand.
“I’m responsible,” he mentioned. “I remorse every part I did. I ask to your forgiveness, even whether it is unforgivable.”
When requested if he wished to reply, the sufferer circled and left the stand.
When requested about his emotions in the direction of his ex-wife, Dominique Pélicot mentioned she didn’t deserve what he did.
“I solely keep in mind shocks and traumas from my youth, which have been partly forgotten due to her,” she mentioned via tears.
At that second the sufferer placed on his sun shades.
Dominique Pélicot later mentioned: “I used to be loopy about her. She changed every part. I ruined every part.”
In 2020, a grocery store safety guard caught Pélicot secretly recording a video up girls’s skirts, in keeping with court docket paperwork. Throughout a search of his residence and digital gadgets, police discovered 1000’s of images and movies of males having intercourse with the sufferer whereas she seemed to be unconscious in mattress.
Utilizing the recordings, police have been capable of find a lot of the 72 suspects they have been searching for, however not all of them.
Along with the images and movies of the sufferer, investigators discovered images of the Pelicots’ daughter and two daughters-in-law that have been surreptitiously taken whereas they have been of their underwear, undressing or showering, in keeping with authorities.
Though her mom remained remarkably calm all through the trial, her daughter walked out of the courtroom on Tuesday as her father was being questioned about images of her discovered on his laptop computer.
“Excuse me, I’ll throw up,” she mentioned angrily earlier than working off. She has written a ebook about what occurred to her household, titled “And I Stopped Calling You Dad.”
After retiring, the Pélicots moved from the Paris area to a home in Mazan, a small city within the Provence area.
When law enforcement officials known as the sufferer in for questioning in late 2020, she initially informed them her husband was “a terrific man,” in keeping with authorized paperwork. They then confirmed her some images. She left and later divorced her husband.
Since Dominique Pélicot’s arrest, different circumstances have emerged. In 2010, he was fined after being caught filming a video of a lady’s crotch and compelled to see a psychologist. The sufferer has mentioned she by no means knew about this incident.
Underneath French regulation, court docket proceedings can’t be filmed or photographed. Dominique Pélicot has been introduced into court docket via a particular entrance that’s not accessible to the media, as he and different defendants are in custody in the course of the trial and can’t be filmed. Defendants who are usually not in custody have been arriving at court docket carrying surgical masks or hoods to stop their faces from being filmed or photographed.
Amongst these hoping to get a seat to look at Tuesday’s proceedings was Bernadette Tessonière, a 69-year-old retiree who lives a half-hour drive from Avignon, the place the trial is going down.
“How is it attainable that after 50 years of dwelling collectively you’ll be able to dwell subsequent to somebody who hides his life so nicely? It is terrifying,” she mentioned.
Printed – September 18, 2024 08:04 am IST