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A man was declared guilty on higher court review of sexually assaulting Gisele Pelicot after she was drugged unconscious by her spouse – and received his prison sentence raised to a decade.

Higher Court Case

The defendant, forty-four, an out-of-work construction worker, who had challenged his first conviction last year, faced a new trial this week at the Nîmes court of appeal.

A jury of nine jurors, joined by three judges, ruled against Dogan on Thursday of raping the victim in her residence in Provence in the morning of 29 June 2019.

The court heard that the accused, a family man, connected with the victim's spouse, the husband, in an internet forum named “unbeknownst to her”, where Pelicot was looking for men to come to his home to assault his wife after he had drugged her into a deep sleep.

We expect the jury will affirm that in this society, fundamental rights are also women’s rights – that permission is personal, not given by another,” stated the victim's lawyer, her legal representative. “Consent is received personally and not via a representative from a spouse.”

Context

The husband, a notorious sex offenders in France's contemporary records, was handed a sentence to twenty years in prison last year for incapacitating his spouse and bringing in numerous individuals to rape her in her home in the Provence village of the village of Mazan over a span of nearly ten years of their union.

Fifty other men were found guilty in a high-profile trial last year, and the appellant was the sole individual to appeal against his conviction. He was initially given a sentence to 9 years in prison, a sentence enhanced on Thursday to ten years.

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

Courtroom Details

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

Pelicot, who was brought from solitary confinement in prison to briefly give evidence at the appeal trial, informed the court that the accused had understood his wife had been “drugged” and he communicated to men by phone: “I’m looking for someone to assault my wife after I’ve sedated her without her knowledge.”

The courtroom became a key topic for a broader debate on rape culture in society as Dogan continued to assert he was innocent and had not engaged in violation, contending 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 shown video evidence of Gisèle Pelicot’s limp body, unconscious and breathing heavily in a comatose state, while a grinning the perpetrator performed assault multiple times over a duration of what authorities reported was three and a half hours. The court official said she had been at peril of death by choking. The state's case said there was no question that she had been unconscious and had not agreed.

Accused's Testimony

Dogan told the court the videos were simply “sex scenes” and rejected it was rape. He said what he did was “a sexual act”, not assault. He declared the court: “I did not commit rape.” He said the victim's husband had allowed him to the home, and therefore it was OK. He said he was influenced by the husband. “I wanted to stop,” the accused informed the court. “I carried on because he reassured me.”

Questioned if he wanted to make a closing remarks to the court, Dogan said: “I never wanted to harm that woman.”

Pelicot's Words

Gisèle Pelicot, who was cheered upon leaving court each day by onlookers present to back her, addressed the defendant in court: “You do not grasp. When will you admit you assaulted me? It is illegal to assault an unaware woman. When did I ever give you consent? Not once.”

Gisèle Pelicot, 72, became an global icon 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, addressing Gisèle Pelicot in court, said the defendant's refusal to take blame showed that: “The shame remains. The community is perhaps in the course of that, maybe propelled by the societal understanding brought by the revelation of your situation.”

The prosecutor said Dogan’s claims of blamelessness showed how normalized violence was still common in society as part of “outdated” forms of “male domination”. He said: “Now we must change rape culture to a ethos of permission.”

Sie said to Dogan: “As long as you refuse to admit it, it’s not just a person, it’s an whole unpleasant societal structure that you are upholding.”

Personal History

The accused was originated from the country of Turkey and at the age of 5 came to France, where his parent worked as a concierge. The court heard that his father was abusive and that the defendant began smoking cannabis at the age of ten. When Dogan was 17 he was apprehended by authorities for drug trafficking and his parent evicted him the residence. He spent time in prison for trafficking in his young adulthood and had worked as a builder but had faced periods of homelessness.

He was married and had a child 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 legal team said this was his method of dealing with his stressful life. Dogan had told a court psychologist that each year he looked for transactional encounters on his birthday. His attorneys informed the court he had a medical condition resulting from the pressure of the first trial.