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An individual was declared guilty on retrial of raping Gisèle Pelicot after she was rendered comatose by her husband – and has had his prison sentence extended to ten years.

Retrial Proceedings

The defendant, forty-four, an out-of-work construction worker, who had challenged his initial guilty verdict last year, faced a retrial this week at the Nîmes court of appeal.

A panel of four women and five men, accompanied by three judges, found Dogan guilty on Thursday of raping the victim in her bedroom in southern France in the morning of 29 June 2019.

The court heard that the accused, a family man, made contact with the victim's spouse, Dominique Pelicot, in an online chatroom named “without her consent”, where Pelicot was seeking men to come to his home to assault his wife after he had sedated her into a unconscious state.

We expect the panel will say loud and clear that in this society, fundamental rights are also rights of women – that agreement is individual, not transferred,” said the victim's attorney, her legal representative. “Consent is secured personally and not by proxy from a spouse.”

Context

The husband, a notorious sexual predators in modern French history, was sentenced to twenty years in prison last year for sedating his wife at the time and soliciting multiple perpetrators to rape her in her home in the community of Mazan over a span of almost a decade of their union.

Dozens of additional defendants were found convicted in a widely publicized trial last year, and Dogan was the only man to challenge his conviction. He was initially sentenced to nine years in prison, a penalty enhanced on Thursday to a decade.

The state's attorney, Dominique Sie, had argued he should serve twelve years, because he “absolutely refuses to take any blame”.

Testimony and Proof

Dogan had initially sent Dominique Pelicot graphic images and then traveled an hour from his village in Provence to assault Gisèle Pelicot, after telling his wife he was stepping out, the testimony revealed.

Pelicot, who was brought from isolation in prison to temporarily provide testimony at the hearing, stated to the court that the accused had been aware his wife had been “sedated” and he communicated to men by phone: “I’m looking for someone to violate my wife after I’ve sedated her without her knowledge.”

The proceedings became a central issue for a wider discussion on rape culture in society as Dogan continued to assert he was blameless and had not perpetrated assault, contending that because Gisèle Pelicot’s husband had invited him into the bedroom, his conduct had been permissible.

The panel in the Nîmes appeals court was shown video evidence of the victim's unconscious figure, sedated and breathing heavily in a comatose state, while a smiling Dogan performed assault on several occasions over a period of what investigators stated was three and a half hours. The presiding judge said she had been at risk of death by asphyxiation. The state prosecution said there was absolute certainty that she had been unaware and had not consented.

Defendant's Statements

Dogan stated to the court the recordings were simply “sexual encounters” and denied it was assault. He said what he did was “a consensual activity”, not assault. He stated the court: “I am innocent of assault.” He said the victim's husband had invited him to the home, and therefore it was acceptable. He said he was deceived by the husband. “I tried to halt,” Dogan stated to the court. “I carried on because he reassured me.”

Questioned if he wanted to make a last words to the court, the defendant said: “I had no desire to hurt that individual.”

Pelicot's Words

Gisèle Pelicot, who was cheered upon exiting the courtroom each day by onlookers gathered to support her, addressed the defendant in court: “You do not grasp. When are you going to recognise you assaulted me? It is illegal to rape an unaware woman. At what point did I give you permission? At no time.”

Gisèle Pelicot, 72, became an global icon after she gave up her right to anonymity in the trial last year when she said: “Shame must change sides.”

Prosecutor's Remarks

The prosecutor, turning to Gisèle Pelicot in court, said the defendant's failure to take accountability showed that: “The shame remains. The community is maybe in the midst of that, perhaps driven by the societal understanding resulting from the revelation of your case.”

Sie said the defendant's claims of blamelessness showed how societal tolerance was still common in society as part of “archaic” forms of “patriarchal control”. He said: “Now we must change rape culture to a ethos of permission.”

The prosecutor addressed Dogan: “While you reject it, it’s not just a individual, it’s an entire unpleasant societal structure that you are supporting.”

Defendant's Background

The accused was originated from Turkey and at the age of 5 relocated to the nation of France, where his father worked as a caretaker. The testimony revealed that his parent was violent and that Dogan began using drugs at the age of 10. When Dogan was seventeen he was apprehended by police for selling narcotics and his father evicted him of home. 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 wed and had a child with special needs, who he was the primary guardian for, as his wife worked in a school canteen. The testimony revealed his wife did not know he had regular sexual encounters outside their union. His legal team said this was his way of coping with his challenging existence. Dogan had stated to a evaluator that annually he sought commercial sex on his special day. His attorneys informed the court he had joint inflammation resulting from the stress of the initial proceedings.