Dominique Pelicot admitted on Tuesday (17) that he is a rapist, as did the other defendants in the trial in the French city of Avignon in which he is accused of drugging his wife for almost ten years to offer her to dozens of men who also sexually abused her.
“I am a rapist, like all the defendants in this court, who knew of her condition when they came,” he said, referring to the fact that the other men knew that his wife, Gisèle Pelicot, was in a state of unconsciousness because of the anxiolytics he was giving her.
In his statement, the ex-husband acknowledged the facts of which he is accused “in their entirety”.
“She didn’t deserve this,” he stressed in reference to his ex-wife (the divorce was formalized in August), after insisting that the other 50 men sitting in the dock next to him were aware of his proceedings and “can’t say otherwise.”
Some of these defendants claim that they did not know that Gisèle Pelicot was unconscious, under the influence of anxiolytics, when they had sexual relations with her, and thought that it was all part of the sexual fantasies shared by the couple and that, therefore, there was consent from both parties.
She claimed, in turn, in a reaction to this first statement by Dominique Pelicot, that in the 50 years she lived with her then husband she could not imagine him being a rapist, that she did not doubt him “not for a second” and that she had confidence in him.
“For 50 years, I lived with a man who I never imagined could commit these acts of rape. He is aware of these acts of rape, but I did not doubt this man for a second. I had complete trust in him. For 50 years, I loved this man, despite some phases,” commented Gisèle.
The main accused said he never considered his “wife as an object, but unfortunately the videos show otherwise.”
After being arrested in September 2020 for filming women up their skirts in a supermarket in the town of Carpentras, investigators who searched his home found on a hard drive hundreds of videos and photos that he had taken during the sexual abuse sessions of his drugged wife, to which he invited dozens of men.
It was these videos and photos that led to the identification of more than 50 men, 49 of whom are on trial in the process that began on September 2 and in which each of them could be sentenced to 20 years in prison for aggravated rape.
Dominique Pelicot recalled that “thanks to these videos, it was possible to find out who participated” and then looked at the other defendants. In addition, he stressed that he kept the files precisely to keep a record of these participants, for the pleasure of watching them and for the “addiction”.
This first testimony by Dominique Pelicot had been postponed for a week due to her health condition and led to the suspension of the trial sessions last Friday and yesterday, Monday.
A team of two doctors who examined him at the request of the president of the Vaucluse Criminal Court, Roger Arata, determined that the main accused was fit to appear at Tuesday’s trial, but with several adaptations, such as breaks of 15 to 20 minutes every 90 minutes of statement.
According to the defendant’s lawyer, Béatrice Zavarro, it was found that Dominique Pelicot has a bladder stone and suffers from a kidney infection. (With EFE Agency)
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