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An individual was declared guilty on retrial of sexually assaulting Gisele Pelicot after she was sedated by her then-husband – and was given his jail term raised to a decade.

Retrial Proceedings

The defendant, 44, an out-of-work construction worker, who had contested his initial guilty verdict last year, experienced a retrial this week at the higher court in Nîmes.

A panel of nine jurors, accompanied by three judges, ruled against Dogan on Thursday of raping the victim in her home in the south of France in the early hours of 29 June 2019.

The evidence showed that Dogan, a family man, connected with the victim's then husband, the husband, in an digital platform called “without her consent”, where Pelicot was seeking men to enter his residence to rape his wife once he had rendered her unconscious into a deep sleep.

We trust the jury will affirm that in this nation, fundamental rights are also rights of women – that permission is individual, not delegated,” stated Gisèle Pelicot’s attorney, Antoine Camus. “Agreement is obtained directly and not via a representative from a husband.”

Background

The husband, a notorious sex offenders in modern French history, was given a prison term to twenty years in prison last year for sedating his wife at the time and inviting dozens of men to rape her in her home in the Provence village of Mazan over a period of nearly ten years of their marriage.

Fifty other men were found culpable in a high-profile trial last year, and the appellant was the single defendant to contest his sentence. He was originally sentenced to 9 years in prison, a sentence enhanced on Thursday to a decade.

The state's attorney, Dominique Sie, had argued he should serve 12 years, because he “absolutely refuses to take any accountability”.

Evidence Presented

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

Pelicot, who was transported from segregation in prison to temporarily testify at the retrial, informed the court that Dogan had been aware his wife had been “drugged” and he told to men by phone: “I want someone to violate my wife after I’ve put her to sleep without her consent.”

The trial became a focus point for a larger conversation on sexual violence norms in society as the defendant continued to say he was innocent and had not perpetrated assault, stating that because the victim's husband had welcomed him into the room, his behavior had been acceptable.

The jury in the Nîmes appeals court was displayed video evidence of Gisèle Pelicot’s unresponsive form, sedated and breathing heavily in a comatose state, while a grinning the perpetrator committed rape multiple times over a period of what investigators stated was several hours. The court official said she had been at risk of death by asphyxiation. The state prosecution said there was no question that she had been unaware and had not agreed.

Dogan's Claims

The defendant informed the court the footage were simply “intimate moments” and disputed it was violation. He said what he did was “a consensual activity”, not assault. He declared the court: “I am innocent of assault.” He said the victim's husband had brought him to the home, and therefore it was permissible. He said he was deceived by Dominique Pelicot. “I wanted to stop,” Dogan stated to the court. “I continued because he persuaded me.”

Inquired if he wanted to make a closing remarks to the court, the defendant said: “I had no desire to harm that individual.”

Pelicot's Words

Gisèle Pelicot, who was applauded upon exiting the courtroom each day by onlookers gathered to support her, addressed Dogan in court: “You haven’t understood. When will you admit you raped me? It’s a crime to rape an unaware woman. At what point did I give you permission? At no time.”

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

State's Argument

The prosecutor, turning to Gisèle Pelicot in court, said Dogan’s unwillingness to take blame showed that: “Guilt has not shifted. Society is possibly in the course of that, maybe motivated by the collective awareness resulting from the exposure of your situation.”

Sie said the defendant's claims of blamelessness showed how societal tolerance was still common in society as part of “archaic” forms of “patriarchal control”. He said: “We need to change the culture of violence to a culture of consent.”

The prosecutor said to the defendant: “As long as you reject it, it’s not just a individual, it’s an complete sordid cultural framework that you are supporting.”

Biographical Details

The accused was born in Turkey and at the age of five moved to France, where his father worked as a concierge. The testimony revealed that his parent was abusive and that Dogan began consuming marijuana at the age of ten. When he was seventeen he was apprehended by authorities for drug trafficking and his parent kicked him out the family house. He served time in prison for narcotics offenses in his young adulthood and had worked as a construction worker but had faced periods of homelessness.

He was wed and had a son with special needs, who he was the main caregiver for, as his spouse worked in a institution's dining hall. The evidence showed his spouse did not know he had regular extramarital activities outside their marriage. His defence said this was his strategy for managing with his stressful life. Dogan had stated to a court psychologist that each year he looked for transactional encounters on his special day. His attorneys told the court he had a medical condition resulting from the pressure of the original case.