The scene in the appeals court felt eerily familiar: the same lead investigator, the same medical expert, and even the same man who was once a perpetrator, now a witness, still in his gray jacket.
Through their individual testimonies, they recounted to the appeals court how Gisèle Pelicot was drugged by her then-husband, Dominique Pelicot, and subsequently raped by him and numerous other men he had invited.
Last year, Ms. Pelicot bravely chose to make the mass rape trial, which focused on her harrowing experience, public. This decision ignited a widespread discussion across France and led to significant legal reforms. However, on Tuesday, during the second day of the appeal for Husamettin Dogan, 44 — one of 51 men convicted in the initial trial (though not all for rape, including Mr. Pelicot) — time in the courtroom seemed to stand still.
Aurore Perez, a 41-year-old feminist activist who closely followed last year’s proceedings in Avignon, found herself once again among the crowd outside the Nimes Court of Appeal. She sang and applauded as Ms. Pelicot, now 72, departed for the day. “I feel like I’m reliving the same nightmare,” Ms. Perez expressed. “We’re exhausted by hearing the identical story over and over.”
The majority of men found guilty of raping Ms. Pelicot while she was in a drugged, near-comatose state received prison sentences ranging from three to fifteen years. Her ex-husband, Mr. Pelicot, is currently serving a 20-year term in isolation.
Mr. Dogan, a married man and primary caregiver for his severely disabled older son, stated during his brief testimony on Monday that he never intended to rape Ms. Pelicot. He claimed he only discovered she had been drugged after his arrest.
However, Mr. Pelicot, wearing the familiar gray jacket from the previous trial, countered this, asserting that Mr. Dogan was fully aware of Ms. Pelicot’s drugged condition.
Experts who interviewed Mr. Dogan, including psychiatrists, psychologists, and a police officer, elaborated in court on Tuesday.
These experts testified that Mr. Dogan initially believed he was going to the couple’s home in the south of France for a threesome. According to Mr. Dogan’s account to the witnesses, Mr. Pelicot had told him his wife was merely “pretending to sleep” as part of their arrangement. Yet, after spending roughly 30 minutes in the bedroom, Mr. Dogan claimed he sensed something was gravely amiss and subsequently left the house.
His arrest came two years later, in 2021, after Mr. Pelicot was caught filming under women’s skirts in a grocery store in 2020, prompting a call to the police.
According to Daouia Boumediene, the police officer who interviewed Mr. Dogan in jail, he blamed Mr. Pelicot for the events, insisting he had simply followed his directions. However, Mr. Dogan’s responses were often evasive and vague. He attributed his reported memory lapses to consuming five whiskeys before arriving at the Pelicot residence.
The extensive collection of videos and photos taken by Mr. Pelicot, which served as crucial evidence, clearly show Mr. Dogan remained at the house for “at least four hours,” stated Jérémie Bosse Platière, a divisional commissioner leading the police investigation. The footage depicts him sexually assaulting Ms. Pelicot eight times, with one instance lasting “at least 30 minutes,” Commissioner Platière noted. When questioned if he believed Mr. Dogan was genuinely unaware of Ms. Pelicot’s condition, the commissioner’s reply was unequivocal: “I’m convinced he was fully aware of it.”
Mr. Pelicot, who entered the court on Tuesday under heavy police escort, testified that he met Mr. Dogan through a notorious website, now defunct, much like the other 50 convicted men in the case. Their initial contact then moved to phone conversations.
According to Mr. Pelicot, he explicitly informed Mr. Dogan that he had drugged his wife. They then reviewed a set of rules he routinely enforced to prevent her from waking during the sexual acts: “no tobacco, no scent, wash his hands in warm water, no violence, and that it would be filmed.”
“All these elements left him no room to doubt her state,” he affirmed.
Mr. Pelicot denied ever referring to the acts as a “game” and insisted he neither dominated nor tricked Mr. Dogan, stating that he “absolutely” did not flee the house.
“I even walked him to the kitchen so he could get dressed,” Mr. Pelicot recalled.
While police managed to uncover Skype exchanges in about 10 cases where Mr. Pelicot explicitly told men he was drugging his wife, no similar communication was found between Mr. Dogan and Mr. Pelicot, Commissioner Bosse Platière informed the court.
Ms. Pelicot, positioned behind her lawyers in the courtroom, listened silently to the testimony, just as she had during the initial trial. Her younger son, Florian, would occasionally reach over to squeeze her shoulder during the most distressing descriptions of the abuse she endured.
Before the trial last year, Ms. Pelicot was an ordinary retired manager who enjoyed walks and spending time with her grandchildren. Since then, her story has gained global recognition, leading to numerous books, plays, and documentaries.
In France, Ms. Pelicot’s case ignited a profound societal debate surrounding misogyny, rape culture, and the disturbing prevalence of “chemical submission” – the practice of using drugs to victimize individuals. Consequently, the government finally approved a long-delayed curriculum for sex education classes. The trial also spurred lawmakers to formally incorporate the concept of consent into the French penal code’s definition of rape, with final reviews of this significant change anticipated later this month.
While many feminist activists argue that these changes don’t go far enough, there’s a general consensus that the case has undeniably left a lasting impact.
“Sociologically, it has fundamentally shifted perspectives,” stated Céline Piques, president of the feminist group Dare Feminism, in an interview just before the appeal. She noted that only a few years ago, her group’s protests against accused rapists garnered minimal support.
On Tuesday evening, a substantial crowd once again gathered outside the courthouse.
They chanted a powerful slogan from the case, originally uttered by defense lawyer Antoine Camus: “Shame must change sides.”