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An individual has been found guilty on appeal of raping Gisele Pelicot following she was drugged unconscious by her spouse – and was given his jail term increased to 10 years.

Appeal Trial

The defendant, forty-four, an unemployed builder, who had contested his initial guilty verdict last year, experienced a retrial this week at the appeals court in Nîmes.

A panel of nine jurors, accompanied by three judges, convicted Dogan on Thursday of sexually assaulting the victim in her bedroom in Provence in the morning of 29 June 2019.

The evidence showed that Dogan, a married father, connected with the victim's husband at the time, the husband, in an internet forum titled “without her consent”, where Pelicot was looking for men to come to his home to assault his wife after he had drugged her into a comatose state.

“We hope the panel will say loud and clear that in this society, fundamental rights are also women’s rights – that agreement is personal, not given by another,” said the victim's attorney, her legal representative. “Consent is received personally and not via a representative from a husband.”

Context

Dominique Pelicot, a notorious sex offenders in modern French history, was handed a sentence to 20 years in prison last year for drugging his spouse and soliciting dozens of men to rape her in her home in the community of Mazan over a duration of many years of their union.

Fifty other men were found culpable in a notable trial last year, and Dogan was the sole individual to challenge his verdict. He was originally given a sentence to 9 years in prison, a sentence enhanced on Thursday to 10 years.

The chief prosecutor, the prosecutor, had argued he should serve twelve years, because he “completely denies to take any blame”.

Courtroom Details

Dogan had first sent Dominique Pelicot inappropriate pictures and then driven an hour from his residence in Provence to rape Gisèle Pelicot, after informing his wife he was stepping out, the testimony revealed.

Pelicot, who was transported from isolation in prison to briefly provide testimony at the retrial, told the court that the accused had known his wife had been “incapacitated” and he communicated to men by phone: “I seek someone to violate my wife after I’ve rendered her unconscious without her consent.”

The trial became a focus point for a wider discussion on sexual violence norms in society as the defendant continued to claim he was not guilty and had not committed rape, contending that because Gisèle Pelicot’s husband had allowed him into the room, his behavior had been permissible.

The panel in the Nîmes appeals court was shown recorded footage of Gisèle Pelicot’s unconscious figure, unconscious and snoring in a comatose state, while a grinning Dogan performed assault multiple times over a timeframe of what investigators stated was several hours. The court official said she had been at peril of death by suffocation. The prosecution said there was absolute certainty that she had been incapacitated and had not consented.

Dogan's Claims

Dogan told the court the footage were simply “intimate moments” and rejected it was rape. He said what he did was “a sexual act”, not assault. He stated the court: “I am innocent of assault.” He said the victim's husband had brought him to the residence, and therefore it was OK. He said he was deceived by Dominique Pelicot. “I wanted to stop,” Dogan told the court. “I carried on because he reassured me.”

Asked if he wanted to make a closing remarks to the court, the defendant said: “I had no desire to injure that lady.”

Victim's Response

The victim, who was supported upon exiting the courtroom each day by onlookers gathered to stand with her, said to Dogan in court: “You fail to comprehend. When will you admit you violated me? It’s a crime to assault an incapacitated woman. When did I ever give you permission? Never.”

The victim, 72, became an global icon after she waived her right to confidentiality in the trial last year when she said: “The shame should shift.”

Legal Commentary

The prosecutor, speaking to Gisèle Pelicot in court, said Dogan’s failure to take blame showed that: “Shame has not yet changed sides. Society is perhaps in the course of that, maybe propelled by the societal understanding brought by the exposure of your case.”

The prosecutor said the defendant's claims of blamelessness showed how societal tolerance was still prevalent in society as part of “archaic” forms of “patriarchal control”. He said: “It is imperative to change the culture of violence to a ethos of permission.”

The prosecutor told Dogan: “While you reject it, it’s not just a individual, it’s an complete unpleasant societal structure that you are upholding.”

Defendant's Background

The accused was born in Turkey and at the age of 5 relocated to France, where his parent worked as a concierge. The court heard that his father was violent and that Dogan began using drugs aged ten. When Dogan was seventeen he was caught by police for dealing drugs and his parent evicted him of home. He was incarcerated in prison for narcotics offenses in his young adulthood and had worked as a builder but had undergone periods of being unhoused.

He was wed and had a son with Down’s syndrome, who he was the principal carer for, as his spouse worked in a educational cafeteria. The evidence showed his spouse did not know he had regular sexual encounters outside their marriage. His legal team said this was his strategy for managing with his difficult circumstances. Dogan had stated to a court psychologist that once a year he sought transactional encounters on his birthday. His attorneys stated to the court he had arthritis caused by the stress of the original case.