Recently, a shocking case came to light from France. In this, a 71-year-old man Dominique Pelicot called unknown men to his house for 10 years to rape his own wife Gisele Pelicot. It is alleged that he got his wife raped 92 times by about 72 men. He kept Gisele constantly under the influence of drugs so that she did not even realize the rapes done on her.
I had to endure a lot after being raped 92 times
Now when the case came to light and reached the court, it seemed as if the victim Giselle had to face a lot more. In fact, Giselle had given up her legal right to remain anonymous so as not to make the case public and said that she wanted to testify on behalf of all those women who have been raped while consuming drugs.
‘The rapists treated me like a rag doll’
Giselle Pellicot, 71, entered the courtroom in the southern city of Avignon on Monday, flanked by her three adult children. She remained largely silent for the first three days of the trial, communicating through her lawyers, but on Thursday she raised her voice to recount the horror of her husband’s crimes. “To be honest, it’s terrifying to me… I’m lying unconscious on the bed and I’m being raped,” she told the court. She also said the rapists “treated me like a rag doll.”
Facing awkward questions in court
Lawyers of some of the defendants questioned how is it possible that you did not realize that you were being raped for almost a decade? Along with this, many indecent questions were asked to her to weaken her case. Like were you in an open marriage? Did you have illicit relations in many places? Giselle Pellicot looked troubled by such questions but kept sitting with courage. However, her three children left the courtroom embarrassed by the questions being asked to their mother. According to the French newspaper Le Monde, Giselle insisted that she never got into an illicit relationship nor was her marriage an open marriage.
71-year-old monster Dominique Pellicot used to recruit unknown men to rape his own wife through an online forum called ‘Without Her Knowing’. He used to make videos of the rapes and sometimes even participated in them himself. Police found 20,000 photos and videos of the French woman being raped about 92 times, which Dominique had kept in a folder called ‘Abuse’.
How was the dark secret of husband’s brutality revealed?
The sexual assault of the woman allegedly started for the first time in 2011 and continued for about ten years. But it came to light in 2020 when the police arrested Dominic for shooting videos of women from under their skirts. During the investigation of this case, the officers were shocked to find such evidence from his house. Then his wife came to know about the incidents of rape with herself which she had been suffering for years without knowing.
51 men accused of rape have been identified
Apart from Dominique, 51 of the 72 rapists have been identified and serious charges have been leveled against them. According to prosecutors, the husband was also one of the rapists and he encouraged the men to abuse his wife. He also made several videos of his misdeeds. According to a BBC report, the woman’s lawyers say that the woman was kept in such a state of unconsciousness that she was not aware of the repeated abuse. This case has shaken France.
Source (PTI) (NDTV) (HINDUSTANTIMES)