The keys to the trial in which shame changed sides: from the dignity of Gisèle Pelicot to the sentences of her husband and his pack

In 2020, a man was arrested in France for filming women upskirt in a supermarket. The fact, totally despicable, might seem like just another headline, but it was the one that uncovered a case for which there are not enough horror adjectives. The man’s name was Dominique Pelicot.

for, for years, having drugged his wife, Gisèle Pelicot, and having offered her to dozens of men to rape her while she was unconscious. His 50 accomplices (that is known), his pack made up of young people, old people, of all types of professions and profiles, have all been declared guilty. Everyone was complicit, everyone remained silent.

The investigators were able to pull this thread of the recordings and found those of the rapes of Gisèle Pelicot, as well as intimate images of her daughter and daughter-in-law, also obtained without her consent.

The victim, in the weeks that the high-profile trial in the Avignon court has lasted, has given a lesson in dignity and fortitude so that “shame changes sides.” These are the keys to everything that happened, the sentences and the lessons that the process has left:

The facts

Not even the passage of time lessens the harshness of the mere transcription of the events. After decades of an apparently ‘happy’, even ‘idyllic’ marriage in the eyes of witnesses, Dominique began the abuse in private and in groups in 2011, systematically raping her after drugging her with high doses of anxiolytics to leave Gisèle in a state of unconsciousness, a ‘chemical submission’ that nullified the victim’s will.

Thus, until 2020, group sexual abuse sessions continued, sometimes with acquaintances and sometimes with strangers whom Dominique contacted online ‘offering’ the body of his then wife. Prosecutors managed to prove at least 92 rapes over ten years.

The sentence states that the ex-husband “endangered” Gisèle’s life due to the abuse and the amount of chemicals that he would have made her ingest without her being aware.

50 men of all ages (from 27 to 74), socioeconomic status and profession. The multiple rape network involved firefighters, journalists, retirees, soldiers, nurses and truck drivers. Many of them would later claim, at trial, that they believed they were “consensual” practices.

The victim herself denied everything, converted into a heroine and standard-bearer of the feminist movement as a result of her case. Gisèle accidentally discovered what that pack of 51 men did to her. It was at the police station, where she went after the complaint about her husband for filming women up their skirts in a supermarket.

In the long and high-profile trial, Dominique Pelicot himself would annul the ‘version’ of his cronies, thus rejecting that they were unaware of the sexual practices to which they subjected Gisèle without her knowledge.

The confession had been total. After recounting his own guilt, Dominique Pelicot still had a strange final argument. An apology for “what happened” with a message in the form of praise for his wife and love for his family to tell her “that I love her.” But his recognition of Gisèle for her “courage” in having been “able to withstand the insinuations of alleged complicity on her part” was especially striking.

In parallel with the trial, psychologists and forensic experts were drawing a profile of Dominique, a “manipulative”, “lying” and “perverse” type. Characteristics that he himself admitted when recognizing that “we are not born a pervert, we become one.”

The sentence(s)

There is no doubt. Dominique Pelicot and his 50 ‘associates’ have been declared guilty, starting with the ex-husband, that ‘good neighbor’ whom no one suspected and who made Gisèle available to dozens of men without her knowing it.

The sentence for Dominique Pelicot is the maximum he could face according to the French Penal Code. 20 years for a series of charges that included aggravated rape for having sedated, sexually assaulted and offered his wife to dozens of strangers, as well as the capture of intimate images of his own daughter. For the ringleader of the abuse plot, 72 years old, prison will be mandatory for at least two thirds, about 14 years, after which he will be able to access conditional freedom.

Behind him, up to five dozen men until completing a range of sentences of more than 400 years in prison; However, far from the 652 that the Prosecutor’s Office claimed. All have been convicted of this rape with the aggravation of “in a meeting”, except four: three only respond for attempted rape because there was no penetration and one for sexual abuse. For most, sentences will range between 8 and 11 years.

Leaving aside the ringleader, the next highest sentence has fallen on a 63-year-old man who raped Gisèle up to six times. Another of the main defendants, Jean-Pierre Maréchal, will spend 12 years behind bars for replicating chemical submission methods with his own wife. On the other hand, six of the accused will be released either because they have been punished with non-prison sentences or because they have already served them in provisional detention.

Feminist icon and symbol of dignity

Without a doubt, Gisèle Pelicot is this year’s feminist icon, to the point that, in recent days, people around the world have pointed out that she should have been the Person of the Year of TIME —the American magazine opted for Donald Trump— and photomontages have circulated on social networks illustrating her as this figure.

The step forward that he chose to take, not to hide his face, to want the trial to be held openly, to testify and even to face the projection in the room of images of rapes that he suffered, has earned him that, both in France Anyway, the word with which it has been most associated is ‘dignity’.

And if ‘dignity’ is the word, the phrase that represents it is the famous “Let shame change sides.” This motto against sexual violence is not his – he actually uttered it in 1974 – but he revived it at the beginning of the sessions. A complete demand that the victims be freed from guilt, because that is what they are, victims, and where the focus should be placed is on the aggressors.

Without going any further, that slogan about shame became that of dozens of demonstrations in Spain this 25N, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. ‘Together, fear changes sides,’ read, for example, the call convened by the 8M Commission in Madrid. If in France the case of Gisèle Pelicot has put consent at the center, it has also resonated strongly in Spain, where we came from—and continue; In fact, the trial for Luis Rubiales’ non-consensual kiss with Jenny Hermoso will begin in February 2025—and where the sexist behaviors they have suffered are proliferating through social networks.

The ‘good guys’ who were bad

The trial has also put on the table that there is no profile of the rapist and that, of course, he is very far from the stereotype of a bad man crouching in a dark alley. Among the 51 defendants, whose ages range from 27 to 74, there was everyone from a firefighter to a retiree to a plumber. No one betrayed, no one reacted. And many, depending on their environment, were good people: good children, good fathers, good husbands.

It makes your hair stand on end to think about a piece of information he gave : Only two of the 72 men identified by the researchers said no after hearing Dominique Pelicot’s offer to rape his drugged wife. Not only that: some ‘offended’ again and raped her up to six times.

As Gisèle’s lawyer, Stéphane Babonneau, indicated, he has broken with the image of the rapist as an aggressor who uses physical violence or as someone who is socially marginalized. “The rapist, in some cases, can be a good father, a good co-worker, a good neighbor. It is important that in the debate that exists in society about rape, the idea that the The rapist is seen coming, who is a bad man by nature. For a long time, this type of conception of the rapist meant that many rapes could not be revealed. person who was well received social”, he stated, in statements collected by .

A new chapter

This Thursday, after hearing the sentence, Gisèle Pelicot gave another lesson in dignity. He has indicated that he respects the court and its decision, but his main message has been for “the unrecognized victims whose stories remain in the shadows”: “I want them to know that we share the same struggle.” “By opening the doors of this process, I wanted society to make its debates its own. I have not regretted it at any time,” he remarked.

Now, although he has described himself as “in ruins”, he continues to go to therapy. However, he has refused to take medication because, as a victim of chemical submission, he does not want to ingest substances.

Precisely during the judicial process, their divorce was finalized. According to the , she has resumed her maiden name, but during the trial she continued to use the surname Pelicot “so that her grandchildren would be proud to be related to them and not be ashamed of being associated with Dominique.”