🔗 Share this article

A defendant was declared guilty on higher court review of sexually assaulting Gisele Pelicot after she was drugged unconscious by her husband – and received his prison sentence raised to ten years.

Appeal Trial

Husamettin Dogan, 44, an unemployed builder, who had contested his first conviction last year, experienced a new trial this week at the appeals court in Nîmes.

A panel of nine jurors, joined by three judges, found Dogan guilty on Thursday of sexually assaulting the victim in her bedroom in Provence in the early hours of 29 June 2019.

The testimony revealed that the accused, a family man, reached out to Gisèle Pelicot’s then husband, Dominique Pelicot, in an digital platform titled “without her consent”, where the husband was recruiting men to enter his residence to rape his wife after he had sedated her into a unconscious state.

We trust the panel will say loud and clear that in this society, human rights are also rights of women – that consent is individual, not transferred,” declared the victim's lawyer, her legal representative. “Agreement is received personally and not through someone else from a husband.”

Background

Dominique Pelicot, one of the worst sexual predators in modern French history, was given a prison term to 20 years in prison last year for sedating his wife at the time and inviting numerous individuals to sexually assault her in her home in the Provence village of Mazan over a period of many years of their marriage.

Numerous other individuals were found culpable in a high-profile trial last year, and the appellant was the single defendant to appeal against his conviction. He was initially sentenced to nine years in prison, a sentence raised on Thursday to a decade.

The lead state prosecutor, the prosecutor, had argued he should serve 12 years, because he “stubbornly rejects to take any accountability”.

Evidence Presented

The defendant had first sent Dominique Pelicot graphic images and then driven an hour from his town in the region to assault Gisèle Pelicot, after telling his wife he was leaving, the court heard.

Pelicot, who was transported from segregation in prison to briefly give evidence at the hearing, informed the court that the accused had been aware his wife had been “drugged” and he said to men by phone: “I want someone to assault my wife after I’ve rendered her unconscious without her consent.”

The trial became a focus point for a wider discussion on societal attitudes in society as Dogan continued to assert he was not guilty and had not perpetrated assault, stating that because Gisèle Pelicot’s husband had allowed him into the room, his conduct had been permissible.

The panel in the Nîmes appeals court was shown video evidence of the victim's unresponsive form, unconscious and breathing heavily in a unconscious condition, while a grinning the perpetrator engaged in violation multiple times over a duration of what police said was three and a half hours. The presiding judge said she had been at risk of fatal outcome by suffocation. The prosecution said there was absolute certainty that she had been incapacitated and had not given permission.

Accused's Testimony

Dogan told the court the footage were simply “sex scenes” and disputed it was rape. He said what he did was “an intimate behavior”, not assault. He stated the court: “I am innocent of assault.” He said Gisèle Pelicot’s husband had brought him to the home, and therefore it was acceptable. He said he was manipulated by the husband. “I attempted to cease,” Dogan informed the court. “I continued because he reassured me.”

Inquired if he wanted to make a closing remarks to the court, the defendant said: “I did not intend to harm that lady.”

Victim's Response

Gisèle Pelicot, who was supported upon departing the trial each day by supporters present to support her, said to Dogan in court: “You fail to comprehend. When will you acknowledge you raped me? It is illegal to rape an incapacitated woman. At what point did I give you consent? Not once.”

Gisèle Pelicot, seventy-two, became an international feminist hero after she relinquished her right to privacy in the trial last year when she said: “The shame should shift.”

State's Argument

The prosecutor, turning to the victim in court, said the defendant's unwillingness to take blame showed that: “Shame has not yet changed sides. The public is maybe in the course of that, possibly propelled by the collective awareness brought by the exposure of your ordeal.”

The prosecutor said the defendant's claims of non-guilt showed how normalized violence was still widespread in society as part of “old-fashioned” forms of “gender-based power”. He said: “Now we must change rape culture to a ethos of permission.”

Sie told Dogan: “While you deny it, it’s not just a individual, it’s an entire disturbing social system that you are upholding.”

Biographical Details

The accused was born in Turkey and at the age of five relocated to France, where his father worked as a building manager. The evidence indicated that his father was abusive and that Dogan began consuming marijuana at the age of 10. When he was seventeen he was stopped by authorities for drug trafficking and his parent forced him to leave the residence. He served time in prison for drug dealing in his twenties and had worked as a laborer but had experienced periods of homelessness.

He was married and had a child with special needs, who he was the principal carer for, as his spouse worked in a school canteen. The evidence showed his wife did not know he had regular intimate relations outside their union. His legal team said this was his way of coping with his difficult circumstances. Dogan had stated to a court psychologist that annually he looked for transactional encounters on his birthday. His attorneys stated to the court he had a medical condition triggered by the pressure of the initial proceedings.