Ex-husband convicted in French mass rape trial will not appeal, says lawyer

Dominique Pelicot was convicted and jailed for 20 years earlier this month after a trial that horrified France and the world

Published: Mon 30 Dec 2024, 9:31 PM

Gisele Pelicot leaves the courthouse after hearing the verdict of the court that sentenced her ex-husband to the maximum term of 20 years jail. Photo: AFP

The Frenchman found guilty of drugging and raping his then-wife and soliciting dozens of men to do the same for more than a decade will not appeal his conviction, his lawyer said Monday.

Dominique Pelicot was convicted and jailed for 20 years earlier this month after a trial that horrified France and beyond, while 50 co-defendants were also convicted and handed various sentences of between three and 15 years.

Gisele Pelicot was hailed as a hero for her courage and dignity throughout the three-month trial.

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"Dominique Pelicot has taken the decision to not appeal the verdict," his lawyer Beatrice Zavarro told AFP and Franceinfo.

An appeal "would force Gisele (Pelicot) to undergo a new ordeal, new confrontations, which Dominique Pelicot refuses" to do, Zavarro said, adding that "it is time to finish judicially".

Prosecutors said that 17 defendants, not including Dominique Pelicot, had filed appeals by the Monday deadline, with the second round of the trial slated for late 2025.

The convicted ringleader had been "astonished to see these appeals, especially (from) individuals who in the dock apologised to Gisele Pelicot," Zavarro said.

"It seems to me that filing an appeal contradicts those words".

Following the guilty verdicts at the end of December, one of Gisele Pelicot's lawyers said she had no fear of a new trial.

"If it were to happen, she has already indicated to us that she would face it -- if she is healthy, obviously, since she is a lady who is now 72," Stephane Babonneau told France Inter radio.

"In any case, she has no fear of it, that is what she told us."

Gisele Pelicot has been praised for refusing to waive her right to a closed trial, saying she wanted to shift the shame associated with rape from victims to perpetrators.

The appeals decisions come weeks before the daughter of Dominique and Gisele Pelicot, Caroline Darian, will narrate a TV documentary on the use of drugs to enable rape and sexual abuse.

Slated for broadcast by France 2 on January 21, the 90-minute film is set to include testimony from six other victims raped after being drugged unwittingly, as Gisele Pelicot was.

They include women attacked at France's annual Fete de la Musique festival of street music aged just 15, another by a boss and one even by her father.

"We are finally lifting the veil on a social reality which is hugely underestimated and much more widespread in France than people think," Darian said at a press conference earlier this month.

France's ANSM medicines safety agency said reports of suspected criminal druggings leapt by 69 percent in 2022, to 1,229 cases -- a figure campaigners say is the tip of the iceberg.

Darian herself believes she was drugged and raped by Dominique Pelicot, after pictures of her naked and unconscious body were found among the detailed records her father kept of his crimes.

She has called for a slew of measures including training for health workers, greater support for victims, and more routine examination of hair samples to detect possible drug traces.

"Our politicians have to really take up this issue. The answers range across disciplines" including the justice, health and education ministries, Darian added.

Her next ambition is to extend the reach of her campaign group "M'endors pas" ("Don't put me to sleep") to Britain, where a translation will appear in January of her book about the Pelicot case, "Et j'ai cesse de t'appeler papa" ("And I stopped calling you Dad").

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