Shocking rape trial highlights the systematic struggles French sexual abuse victims face

AVIGNON, France (AP) — The trial of dozens of men accused of raping an unconscious woman whose husband repeatedly drugged her over the course of nearly a decade has highlighted the difficulties that sexual violence victims can face in France.

Dominique Pelicot, 71, and his 50 co-defendants face up to 20 years in prison if they're convicted at a trial that has shocked the world and riveted the French public.

Pelicot tearfully acknowledged in court that he's guilty of the allegations against him, and he said all of his co-defendants understood exactly what they were doing when he invited them to his home in Provence between 2011 and 2020 to have sex with his unconscious and unwitting wife, who divorced him after learning what he had done to her.

Despite evidence including meticulously archived photos and videos that Pelicot shot of the alleged rapes, some of the defendants’ lawyers have scrutinized Gisèle Pelicot’s private life and motives, even questioning whether she was truly unconscious during some of the encounters. Although they must defend their clients to the best of their abilities, the lawyers' tactics have outraged advocates for the sexually abused, who say the attorneys show that victim-blaming is alive and well in France.

“This trial is the trial of our society,” 27-year-old Nathan Paris, who works in a youth shelter, said this week outside the Avignon courthouse. Paris, a victim of sexual violence himself, has made the trip from Marseille on several occasions since the trial began.

“The French population has evolved … and I feel like justice has not evolved over that time,” he said, vowing to keep coming back until the trial ends.

The co-defendants range in age from their 20s to their 70s and represent a cross-section of French men: There is a firefighter, a journalist, a nurse, a prison guard and a construction worker. Some are retired, some are unemployed and many have families of their own. One knew he had HIV when he raped Gisèle Pelicot on six occasions and chose not to wear a condom, according to police. She didn't contract HIV, though she was found to have other sexually transmitted diseases, a medical expert testified.

Magali Lafourcade, a judge and general secretary of the National Consultative Commission of Human Rights who is not involved in the trial, said the fight against sexual violence in France has slightly improved since the start of the #MeToo movement, which has brought down some of France’s most well-known actors and film directors, among other notables. Women have always talked, but their voices are now being heard more, she said.

“For a very long time, we saw the rape and killing of women by men as something that pertained to the private sphere — we thought we should not interfere with people’s private lives,” Lafourcade said.

“There has been a clear change, or revolution even, with this perception since #MeToo,” she added.

Civic groups have lobbied hard in recent years so that judges, politicians and the media understand that sexual violence is not just a private affair, but also a societal, political and financial one, Lafourcade said.

French President Emmanuel Macron has promised to prioritize gender equality and combat violence against women. But France’s public policies are still lagging, and more resources and effort need to be put toward going after sexual offenders, experts told The Associated Press.

Lawyers and analysts agree that in many ways, the Pelicot trial is a slam dunk thanks to its abundance of highly incriminating evidence and its lead defendant's admission of guilt.

Gisèle Pelicot also defies the widespread stereotype among French society that women who are raped might have provoked their assailants by seeking to attract the male gaze or being imprudent. She is a grandmother in her 70s who was drugged and unconscious whenever she was assaulted, according to police.

“Most victims don’t have that,” said Celine Piques, a spokesperson of the feminist group Osez le Féminisme!, or Dare Feminism!, stressing that 90% of women who say they were raped don't pursue charges because they don't think they'll stand a chance. “In most cases, the victims’ words are called into question and the shame falls on them rather than on the man who committed the rape.”

Piques said she has been particularly shocked by the questions about Gisèle Pelicot’s sex life, including “whether she was into swinging or threesomes, when this woman was drugged and unconscious.”

Gisèle Pelicot has shown remarkable calm and stoicism during the trial, even throughout the most gruesome and explicit descriptions of the abuse she suffered. But she grew exasperated on Wednesday when defense lawyers questioned her about graphic images taken of her that were shown in court for the first time. She had agreed to their display because she said she hoped they would serve as “undeniable evidence.”

“I understand why victims of rape don’t press charges,” Pelicot told the five judges after a lawyer asked if she wasn't hiding any unusual sexual “tendencies.”

“I’m not even going to answer this question, which I find insulting,” she responded, her voice breaking.

She told the court that the first two weeks of the trial had been harrowing, saying, “Since I’ve arrived in this courtroom, I’ve felt humiliated. I am treated like an alcoholic, an accomplice. ... I have heard it all.”

Pelicot has become a symbol of the fight against sexual violence in France, and she's seen as a hero to many victims for waiving her anonymity, letting the trial be public and appearing openly before the media. She has attended every day of the trial, where she has sat in a room full of men accused of raping her.

But despite the nauseating details that have emerged during the trial, it hasn’t stopped some from minimizing the abuse, with the mayor of the small community where the Pelicots lived, Mazan, apologizing Thursday for suggesting in a BBC interview that things could have been worse because “no children were involved” and “nobody died.”

Such dismissiveness is pervasive in France's justice system, Lafourcade said.

“We have a real problem with the judiciary's treatment of sexual infractions, which is very painful for the victims and has a chilling effect,” she said. “It discourages people from pressing charges.”

Given how few cases are reported and how seldom the ones that are end in convictions, only a tiny fraction of assailants actually go to prison, Lafourcade said.

“And to reduce a crime, it is not the severity of the sentence that counts," she added. "It is the fact of being certain of being caught.”

Pelicot's supporters believe she is making a difference by courageously facing the men accused of raping her and that broader change is on the horizon.

“Before, we never would have questioned a lawyer and his line of defense,” said Paris, the youth shelter worker. “But today society is changing, people monitor what is happening and take into consideration the suffering of others.”