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An individual was declared guilty on higher court review of sexually assaulting Gisèle Pelicot following she was sedated by her then-husband – and has had his prison sentence increased to a decade.

Retrial Proceedings

Husamettin Dogan, 44, an unemployed builder, who had challenged his first conviction last year, experienced a new trial this week at the Nîmes court of appeal.

A panel of four women and five men, accompanied by three judges, convicted Dogan on Thursday of raping Pelicot in her bedroom in Provence in the morning of 29 June 2019.

The court heard that Dogan, a married father, made contact with Gisèle Pelicot’s spouse, Dominique Pelicot, in an online chatroom named “unbeknownst to her”, where the husband was looking for men to come to his home to assault his wife once he had drugged her into a unconscious state.

We expect the jury will say loud and clear that in this nation, fundamental rights are also rights of women – that permission is individual, not given by another,” stated Gisèle Pelicot’s lawyer, Antoine Camus. “Agreement 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 given a prison term to two decades in prison last year for incapacitating his wife at the time and soliciting multiple perpetrators to rape her in her home in the Provence village of the village of Mazan over a period of nearly ten years of their marriage.

Fifty other men were found culpable in a notable trial last year, and Dogan was the single defendant to challenge his conviction. He was initially given a sentence to nine 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 “stubbornly rejects to take any blame”.

Testimony and Proof

The defendant had initially sent Dominique Pelicot sexually explicit photos and then traveled an hour from his village in the region to rape Gisèle Pelicot, after informing his wife he was stepping out, the evidence indicated.

Pelicot, who was transported from isolation in prison to briefly testify at the retrial, informed the court that Dogan had been aware his wife had been “drugged” and he said to men by phone: “I seek someone to violate my wife after I’ve sedated her without her knowledge.”

The trial became a central issue for a broader debate on societal attitudes in society as the defendant continued to assert he was innocent and had not perpetrated assault, stating that because the victim's husband had allowed him into the bedroom, his conduct had been permissible.

The panel in the higher court was shown video evidence of the victim's limp body, comatose and snoring in a comatose state, while a smiling the perpetrator engaged in violation on several occasions over a period of what investigators stated was three and a half hours. The presiding judge said she had been at peril of death by asphyxiation. The prosecution said there was absolute certainty that she had been unconscious and had not agreed.

Accused's Testimony

Dogan stated to the court the videos were simply “intimate moments” and denied it was rape. He said what he did was “an intimate behavior”, not assault. He told the court: “I never raped.” He said Gisèle Pelicot’s husband had allowed him to the home, and therefore it was permissible. He said he was deceived by Dominique Pelicot. “I wanted to stop,” Dogan informed the court. “I continued because he convinced me.”

Inquired if he wanted to make a last words to the court, Dogan said: “I did not intend to injure that lady.”

Survivor's Statement

The victim, who was applauded upon departing the trial each day by crowds present to back her, addressed Dogan in court: “You do not grasp. When will you acknowledge you violated me? It is unlawful to rape an unaware woman. How could I have give you agreement? At no time.”

The victim, 72, became an international feminist hero after she waived her right to anonymity in the trial last year when she said: “Shame must change sides.”

Prosecutor's Remarks

The prosecutor, addressing Gisèle Pelicot in court, said Dogan’s failure to take accountability showed that: “Guilt has not shifted. The community is possibly in the process of that, maybe driven by the collective awareness brought by the exposure of your situation.”

Sie said Dogan’s claims of innocence showed how normalized violence was still widespread in society as part of “old-fashioned” forms of “male domination”. He said: “Now we must change rape culture to a ethos of permission.”

Sie told the defendant: “For as much as you deny it, it’s not just a individual, it’s an entire unpleasant societal structure that you are endorsing.”

Biographical Details

Dogan was born in Turkey and at the age of five relocated to France, where his parent worked as a caretaker. The evidence indicated that his parent was violent and that Dogan began smoking cannabis at the age of ten. When Dogan was seventeen he was apprehended by police for selling narcotics and his parent kicked him out the family house. He served time in prison for trafficking in his twenties and had worked as a construction worker but had undergone periods of homelessness.

He was wed and had a child with a genetic condition, who he was the principal carer for, as his wife worked in a institution's dining hall. The testimony revealed his spouse did not know he had repeated extramarital activities beyond their marriage. His defence said this was his strategy for managing with his challenging existence. Dogan had informed a mental health expert that each year he engaged in commercial sex on his birthday. His lawyers informed the court he had joint inflammation triggered by the anxiety of the original case.