A grandmother whose husband allegedly drugged her and invited 50 men to rape her took the witness stand this morning in France’s worst ever sexual abuse trial.
Gisele Pelicot bravely waived her right to anonymity to make public details of the horrific betrayal her partner of 50 years had forced her to endure over ten years.
Today Madame Pelicot, 71, will relive the trauma that she experienced when a police investigator showed her graphic films of her being raped repeatedly by her husband Dominique and more than 80 strangers while she was unconscious.
Madame Pelicot, who has three grown up children and seven grandchildren, is determined that the public knows that she played no part in her husband’s warped sexual fantasies that he played out at their picturesque chalet home in the Provence village of Mazan.
Madame Pelicot said during her testimony this morning: ‘I was sacrificed by my husband for these obscenities – a woman drugged and abused. It was like I was dead. I was treated like a piece of meat.’
She also revealed that she was convinced she had Alzheimer’s after suffering memory loss in 2011 and 2013, but her husband dismissed her concerns.
Dominique Pelicot and 50 others are accused of raping her. Pelicot and 14 of his co-accused have admitted their part in France’s worst rape case.
Gisele Pelicot (pictured arriving to court this morning) bravely waived her right to anonymity to make public details of the horrific betrayal her partner of 50 years had forced her to endure over ten years
Dominique Pelicot and 50 other accused of raping her. Pelicot and 14 of his co-accused have admitted their part in France’s worst rape case
Today Madame Pelicot, 71, will relive the trauma that she experienced when police investigator showed her graphic films of her being raped repeatedly by her husband Dominique and more than 80 strangers while she was unconscious
Madame Pelicot is determined that the public knows that she played no part in her husband’s warped sexual fantasies that he played out at their picturesque chalet home in the Provence village of Mazan (pictured)
But 35 men – from all walks of life – deny that they forced themselves on Madame Pelicot while she was unconscious, claiming that she in some way consented.
However this morning Madame Pelicot who had no idea of the abuse her husband was putting her through over a decade, is determined that France and the rest of world hear her testimony.
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Wearing a long, orange dress, a white blouse and a gold necklace, Madame Pelicot sat with her head held high in the same courtroom as the 50 men accused her raping her.
Accompanied by her three grown-up children, the 71-year-old with a smart auburn bob appeared defiant in the face of her abusers.
She stared up at the ceiling of the Avignon court room and gave a heavy sigh as Judge Roger Arata opened the fourth day of the trial that has shocked France.
Across the room Dominique Pelicot, her grey-haired husband of 50 years – who claims to have adored his wife – looked at her without expression.
Madame Pelicot had no idea that she was being subjected to this terrible betrayal until her husband was arrested for ‘upskirting’ at his local supermarket and police discovered a library of ‘sex-movies’ at their home.
At 9.20am Madame Pelicot took the witness stand to give evidence.
Wearing a long, orange dress, a white blouse and a gold necklace, Madame Pelicot sat with her head held high in the same courtroom as the 50 men accused her raping her
Mr Pelicot’s daughter, Caroline Darian, arrived to court alongside her mother this morning
Madame Pelicot had no idea that she was being subjected to this terrible betrayal until her husband was arrested for ‘upskirting’ at his local supermarket and police discovered a library of ‘sex-movies’ at their home (pictured above)
Some of the 50 co-defendants accused of rape speak with a lawyer at the courthouse in the case that has shocked France on Monday, September 2
Madame Pelicot is pictured above as she arrived to court this morning
She gave her name, maiden name and age into the microphone.
Judge Arata tried to reassure her that she should take her time to make her testimony. And he warned her she would face cross examination.
She said: ‘I would not be before you if it were not for the work of the police of Carpentras [the town where the supermarket where her husband was arrested in 2020].
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‘On that day in September I had been away with my daughter. I returned home to Mazan and I sat in the kitchen.
‘Monsieur Pelicot told me; “I have done something silly. I took some photographs in the supermarket”.
‘After 50 years of marriage I said I would forgive him. But if there was a second time I would leave him.
‘In October I went to Paris to look after two of my grandchildren.
‘I received a phone call from the police who told me they wanted to talk to me.
‘I made an appointment in November at the police headquarters in Carpentras.’
She continued: ‘We were later summoned to the police. I knew he had taken photos of these women and thought we were going as a formality.’
Madame Pelicot told the court that she would remember walking up the steps to the police station ‘for the rest of my life’.
At the station, where she was wearing a mask as it was during the Covid pandemic, a police officer told her: ‘I’m going to tell you something you won’t like.’
She said: ‘For 50 years I always supported my husband, health, financial and couple problems. It was based on trust.’
Pictured above is a general view of where the Pelicots lived which has been known as the house of horrors, with a creepy back alley
Dominique Pelicot can be seen in this court sketch on the right
‘I’m a woman who only one man can touch, Mr Pelicot, no other can put a hand on me,’ she added, as reported by the Telegraph.
Madame Pelicot continued: ‘But I left and went home while my husband was in custody. The trauma was enormous. The shock. I returned home to my little dog. I could not stay alone. I had to go to see some friends.
‘I told my son that his father was in custody, that he had been charged. On the 3rd of November I went to the police station at Carpentras.
‘The police showed me the videos. My world collapsed. When I told my daughter she screamed.
‘I left my house with two suitcases and my dog. That was all I had after 50 years of marriage. Everything was based on trust in 50 years.
Caroline Darian’s book
‘My daughter had a nervous breakdown and required medical help.’
‘When I told my sons about this, I don’t think they really understood, they were withdrawn and didn’t react much. I think they were in a state of shock. They said don’t say such silly things,’ she said, as reported by the Telegraph.
‘[That] evening, the children rang all the time saying don’t disappear, they were worried I might die.’
Madame Pelicot continued: ‘You can’t imagine yourself in a situation like that. In that moment I wanted to disappear.
‘I had to tell my children that their father was in custody. I called my son-in-law and told my daughter and told them: “He raped me”. Then I heard my daughter screaming a deep cry that I cannot get out of my head.
‘People in the street – at the bakery at the supermarket, asked me if I was ok. I had to leave the area. I could not stay in that house. I had lost everything, my husband, my life.
‘I didn’t know who I was or where I was going. I had lost my identity. My son moved me out of that house.’
Referring to the sex tapes her husband had made of strangers abusing her she said: ‘This was not sex it was rape. I have never practiced open sex, I was never swinger.
‘I was never a victim, until now. I had to get help, counselling.’
Madame Pelicot said she believed the first instance of being drugged was in 2011 when she woke up in the afternoon with no memory.
A black and white facial reconstruction of a younger Dominique Pelicot is seen in this handout image
Dominique Pelicot is accused of orchestrating the rape ring
She said: ‘One day in 2011, I woke up at 6pm in the evening. That was not right. I never sleep until 6pm in the evening. I knew this was not normal but I could understand why.
‘I had no memory of the day. I asked Monsieur Pelicot what had happened.’
The couple moved to the village in Provence two years later in 2013. She said: ‘In March 2013 we left Paris for Mazan and this “absence” started again.
‘I have an excellent memory. I joked to my husband, “you’re not drugging me are you?”
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‘He broke down in tears and said; “you actually think I could do that?”
‘I went to see a neurologist. I was convinced I had Alzheimer’s. He said don’t worry. I had scans but the absences continued. I don’t remember any of the sex scenes.
‘My son told my husband that I was not well. He said “don’t worry”.’
Madame Pelicot added: ‘I was sacrificed by my husband for these obscenities – a woman drugged and abused. It was like I was dead. I was treated like a piece of meat.
‘This is why I am speaking out, – for all the other women who are abused. It was humiliating what I have gone through.
‘It started when I learned from the investigating magistrate that Mr Pelicot had filmed up women’s skirts with a hidden camera in a pen.
‘I learned that in 2010 he had done something similar. If I had known back then I would have perhaps I would have been more vigilant. I could have won back ten years of my life.’
Madame Pelicot added: ‘These videos are all more horrible than the others. It’s barbaric, I don’t know how my body is strong enough to stand before you today.’
Gisele Pelicot (C) sits next to her daughter Caroline Darian (2ndL) and her sons Florian Pelicot (L) and David Pelicot (2ndR) with his wife Celine F. (R), at the courthouse during the trial of her husband on September 2
The town of Mazan, 20 miles from Avignon in southern France, where the victim and her husband lived and the attacks took place
The grandmother recalled how her own mother died when she was just nine years old and that she left school aged only 13 to find work.
She said: ‘At 13 I was knocking on factory doors asking for work. When I was two years old I knew that my mother had an incurable disease. But I never saw my grandmother cry. We don’t show tears in my family.’
Monsieur Pelicot broke down in tears in the dock as she listened to his estranged wife detail how they fell in love and started their 50-year married life together.
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Wiping his eyes, the grey-haired multiple rapist appeared to be unable to listen to her memory of their once happy life.
She recalled: ‘Then I met M Pelicot. He had a tyrannical family. He had to give all of his wages to his parents. I married very young. I was 20 years old.
‘We needed permission from our parents. My dad was not in favour of the wedding but he accepted it. We had no money but we were very much in love. I have never been with another man.
‘We were not rich but we were happy. Monsieur Pelicot is an electrician. He retrained as an estate agent. He had kidney stones and almost died. And then the real estate crisis. No money was coming in but I still supported him.
‘I knew he was courageous. He has always worked hard.’
She added: ‘[After M Pelicot’s arrest], I learned that he had been raped aged nine. He wasn’t supported by his parents. We could have dealt with it together.
‘I’m being treated by a psychiatrist now. Rape scenes are torture scenes. Why does anyone deserve to go though that?’
After giving her testimony, Judge Arata began to question Madame Pelicot.
The judge asked: ‘Did Monsieur Pelicot have any sexual desires that you did not want to take part in?’
Beatrice Zavarro (C), lawyer for the accused Dominique P, speaks with lawyers at the courthouse during the trial of her client accused of drugging his wife for nearly ten years and inviting strangers to rape her at their home in Mazan
Gisele Pelicot, 72, arrives at the courthouse in Avignon this morning ahead of the third day of her husband’s trial on September 4, 2024
Madame Pelicot replied: ‘Once we went to a nightclub with another couple where there was a “swingers’ room”. But I didn’t want to get involved in that so we did not go into that room and we just stayed in the main nightclub.’
The judge asked if she suffered any problems after being abused for ten years.
Madame Pelicot replied: ‘I have gynaecological problems. I was diagnosed with four sexually transmitted diseases at the Versailles medical forensic unit.’
She added: ‘I was tested for HIV as one man who came (to rape me) six times was seropositive. My life was in danger but not one second did anyone stop. Luckily I didn’t catch it. But not once did Mr Pelicot say to himself, “I’ve gone too far”.’
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‘He showed no pity, no pity at all,’ Madame Pelicot said, as reported by the Telegraph.
The judge told her that Mr Pelicot has acknowledged his crimes, and asked her; ‘What do you feel about this?’
Madame Pelicot replied: ‘Feelings of disgust. We had everything, we had a great life. I don’t understand how this could have happened.’
The judge ended his interrogation with what he described as a ‘very difficult question’.
He asked: ‘Madame Pelicot, are you in any way complicit in Monsieur Pelicot’s activities?’
She replied calmly: ‘Absolutely not. I never pretended to be asleep or anything like that.’
Another judge asked Madame Pelicot whether she and her husband ever discussed filming their sexual intercourse.
She said: ‘I never agreed to Monsieur Pelicot filming us having sex. No the only time we talked about something like this was at the swingers’ room at the nightclub.
‘I understood that he would have wanted to do it. But for me it was impossible.’
The shocking trial, which began on Monday, is set to end on December 20 with 50 people, including Mr Pelicot, facing aggravated rape charges.