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An individual has been found guilty on retrial of raping Gisele Pelicot after she was sedated by her husband – and received his prison sentence increased to ten years.

Retrial Proceedings

Husamettin Dogan, forty-four, an unemployed builder, who had challenged his initial guilty verdict last year, underwent a appeal hearing this week at the Nîmes court of appeal.

A jury of four women and five men, joined by three judges, convicted Dogan on Thursday of raping the victim in her residence in Provence in the early hours of 29 June 2019.

The evidence showed that Dogan, a family man, reached out to the victim's then husband, Dominique Pelicot, in an internet forum named “without her knowledge”, where the husband was seeking men to enter his residence to rape his wife after he had sedated her into a comatose state.

We expect the jury will declare that in this nation, human rights are also women’s rights – that agreement is individual, not transferred,” declared the victim's attorney, her legal representative. “Consent is secured directly and not via a representative from a husband.”

Case History

Dominique Pelicot, a notorious sex offenders in France's contemporary records, was given a prison term to twenty years in prison last year for drugging his spouse and bringing in multiple perpetrators to sexually assault her in her home in the town of Mazan over a period of many years of their marriage.

Dozens of additional defendants were found convicted in a notable trial last year, and the appellant was the single defendant to contest his verdict. He was first sentenced to nine years in prison, a sentence raised on Thursday to a decade.

The lead state prosecutor, Dominique Sie, had stated he should serve 12 years, because he “absolutely refuses to take any accountability”.

Testimony and Proof

The defendant had initially sent Dominique Pelicot sexually explicit photos and then driven an hour from his village in Provence to assault the victim, after notifying his wife he was going out, the testimony revealed.

Pelicot, who was transported from isolation in prison to briefly testify at the hearing, informed the court that Dogan had understood his wife had been “incapacitated” and he told to men by phone: “I want someone to violate my wife after I’ve rendered her unconscious without her consent.”

The trial became a central issue for a wider discussion on sexual violence norms in society as Dogan continued to claim he was blameless and had not perpetrated assault, arguing that because the victim's husband had welcomed him into the residence, his behavior had been justifiable.

The panel in the Nîmes appeals court was presented with recorded footage of Gisèle Pelicot’s unconscious figure, unconscious and snoring in a unconscious condition, while a grinning Dogan committed rape repeatedly over a timeframe of what authorities reported was 3.5 hours. The presiding judge said she had been at danger of fatal outcome by suffocation. The state's case said there was no doubt that she had been unaware and had not given permission.

Dogan's Claims

Dogan told the court the footage were simply “intimate moments” and denied it was rape. He said what he did was “a sexual act”, not assault. He stated the court: “I never raped.” He said Gisèle Pelicot’s husband had brought him to the house, and therefore it was permissible. He said he was deceived by the husband. “I wanted to stop,” the accused told the court. “I proceeded because he persuaded me.”

Inquired if he wanted to make a final statement to the court, the defendant said: “I did not intend to harm that individual.”

Victim's Response

The survivor, who was cheered upon departing the trial each day by onlookers assembled to support her, said to Dogan in court: “You haven’t understood. When are you going to recognise you assaulted me? It is illegal to rape an unaware woman. When did I ever give you agreement? At no time.”

Gisèle Pelicot, 72, became an symbol of resistance after she waived her right to privacy in the trial last year when she said: “Guilt ought to transfer.”

Legal Commentary

The prosecutor, turning to the victim in court, said Dogan’s failure to take accountability showed that: “The shame remains. The community is possibly in the course of that, perhaps motivated by the societal understanding brought by the exposure of your case.”

Sie said Dogan’s claims of innocence showed how societal tolerance was still prevalent in society as part of “old-fashioned” forms of “gender-based power”. He said: “We need to change rape culture to a culture of consent.”

Sie said to the defendant: “For as much as you reject it, it’s not just a individual, it’s an whole unpleasant societal structure that you are upholding.”

Biographical Details

The accused was born in the country of Turkey and at the age of five came to the nation of France, where his father worked as a building manager. The testimony revealed that his father was violent and that the defendant began consuming marijuana aged ten. When Dogan was seventeen he was caught by authorities for dealing drugs and his father kicked him out the residence. He served time in prison for drug dealing in his early 20s and had worked as a builder but had faced periods of being unhoused.

He was married and had a child with Down’s syndrome, who he was the main caregiver for, as his wife worked in a school canteen. The testimony revealed his spouse did not know he had regular intimate relations beyond their marriage. His defence said this was his way of coping with his challenging existence. Dogan had told a evaluator that once a year he engaged in commercial sex on his special day. His legal representatives stated to the court he had joint inflammation triggered by the pressure of the initial proceedings.