🔗 Share this article

A defendant was convicted on retrial of raping Gisèle Pelicot following she was drugged unconscious by her then-husband – and received his jail term raised to a decade.

Appeal Trial

Husamettin Dogan, 44, an out-of-work construction worker, who had contested his initial guilty verdict last year, underwent a appeal hearing this week at the higher court in Nîmes.

A jury of five men and four women, joined by three judges, convicted Dogan on Thursday of sexually assaulting Pelicot in her residence in southern France in the morning of June 29, 2019.

The court heard that the accused, a married father, made contact with Gisèle Pelicot’s husband at the time, Dominique Pelicot, in an online chatroom named “unbeknownst to her”, where Pelicot was looking for men to visit his house to rape his wife after he had sedated her into a unconscious state.

“We hope the jury will say loud and clear that in this society, human rights are also women’s rights – that permission is personal, not delegated,” said the victim's attorney, her legal representative. “Consent is obtained personally and not via a representative from a husband.”

Context

The husband, one of the worst sexual predators in France's contemporary records, was sentenced to twenty years in prison last year for sedating his wife at the time and inviting numerous individuals to sexually assault her in her home in the community of Mazan over a span of nearly ten years of their union.

Numerous other individuals were found convicted in a widely publicized trial last year, and the appellant was the only man to contest his conviction. He was first handed a term to 9 years in prison, a sentence increased on Thursday to ten years.

The chief prosecutor, Dominique Sie, had stated he should serve 12 years, because he “absolutely refuses to take any responsibility”.

Testimony and Proof

Dogan had first sent Dominique Pelicot sexually explicit photos and then traveled an hour from his town in the region to rape the victim, after telling his wife he was stepping out, the court heard.

Pelicot, who was brought from solitary confinement in prison to briefly testify at the appeal trial, told the court that the accused had known his wife had been “incapacitated” and he told to men by phone: “I’m looking for someone to abuse my wife after I’ve put her to sleep without her consent.”

The trial became a key topic for a larger conversation on societal attitudes in society as the defendant continued to assert he was not guilty and had not perpetrated assault, arguing that because the victim's husband had welcomed him into the room, his conduct had been acceptable.

The panel in the Nîmes appeals court was displayed video evidence of the victim's limp body, comatose and snoring in a unconscious condition, while a grinning Dogan engaged in violation on several occasions over a timeframe of what authorities reported was several hours. The judge said she had been at risk of fatal outcome by suffocation. The prosecution said there was no question that she had been unconscious and had not consented.

Accused's Testimony

The defendant informed the court the footage were simply “sex scenes” and disputed it was rape. He said what he did was “a sexual act”, not assault. He told the court: “I am innocent of assault.” He said Gisèle Pelicot’s husband had invited him to the residence, and therefore it was OK. He said he was manipulated by Dominique Pelicot. “I attempted to cease,” Dogan stated to the court. “I continued because he reassured me.”

Inquired if he wanted to make a closing remarks to the court, the defendant said: “I did not intend to harm that lady.”

Pelicot's Words

Gisèle Pelicot, who was applauded upon departing the trial each day by onlookers gathered to back her, addressed Dogan in court: “You do not grasp. When will you acknowledge you violated me? It is illegal to assault an unaware woman. When did I ever give you agreement? Not once.”

Gisèle Pelicot, 72, became an global icon after she gave up her right to confidentiality in the trial last year when she said: “The shame should shift.”

State's Argument

Sie, addressing the victim in court, said Dogan’s failure to take responsibility showed that: “The shame remains. The public is perhaps in the midst of that, perhaps motivated by the societal understanding resulting from the revelation of your ordeal.”

Sie said Dogan’s claims of blamelessness showed how normalized violence was still prevalent in society as part of “outdated” forms of “patriarchal control”. He said: “We need to change the culture of violence to a society based on agreement.”

The prosecutor told Dogan: “As long as you deny it, it’s not just a individual, it’s an complete unpleasant cultural framework that you are upholding.”

Biographical Details

The accused was originated from Turkey and at the age of 5 moved to the nation of France, where his father worked as a concierge. The testimony revealed that his parent was violent and that Dogan began consuming marijuana at the age of 10. When Dogan was 17 he was caught by police for selling narcotics and his father kicked him out the residence. He spent time in prison for narcotics offenses in his early 20s and had worked as a construction worker but had undergone periods of being unhoused.

He was married and had a child with Down’s syndrome, who he was the principal carer for, as his wife worked in a educational cafeteria. The court heard his spouse did not know he had frequent extramarital activities beyond their marriage. His legal team said this was his method of dealing with his difficult circumstances. The defendant had stated to a evaluator that each year he engaged in paid sex on his special day. His legal representatives told the court he had joint inflammation triggered by the anxiety of the original case.