Featured Image Credit: Arnold Jerocki/Getty Images
Topics: Crime, Domestic Abuse, France, World News, Gisele Pelicot
Callum Jones
Topics: Crime, Domestic Abuse, France, World News, Gisele Pelicot
Warning: This article contains discussion of rape which some readers may find distressing.
The only man to challenge his conviction for raping Gisèle Pelicot has seen his sentence increased by a court in Southern France.
Gisèle's ex-husband, Dominique Pelicot, admitted to knocking out his wife of 50 years with drugs, so he and strangers recruited online could abuse her while he filmed the assaults, and stored them on a hard drive labeled 'abuse'.
The highly-publicised case saw details emerge that Gisèle was sedated against her will between 2011 and 2020.
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He inserted sleeping pills and other drugs into her food, which made Gisèle unconscious.
As well as the crimes against his ex-wife, Pelicot was also found guilty of the attempted aggravated rape of the wife of one of the co-accused, and taking indecent images of his daughter, Caroline Darian, as well as his daughters-in-law.
He is now behind bars after being sentenced to 20 years imprisonment.
Husamettin Dogan, 44, argued he was innocent in the case, claiming he could not be guilty of raping Gisèle due to him not realizing she had been drugged by her husband against her will.
Proceedings in Nîmes saw videos of the rape, first played in the trial last year, which saw an unconscious Gisèle having no reaction and snoring to the horrific abuse she was subjected to.
Despite Dogan being in the footage, he denied any intention of raping Gisèle.
"I performed a sexual act, I never raped anyone," he said, as per the BBC. "For me, rape means forcing someone, tying them up, I don't know … I am a victim."
Meanwhile, Gisèle told the court she had never gave her consent.
"The first time I saw [Dogan's] face was when I saw the videos of him raping me," she said. "They are forever etched in my memory.
"The first time around, this man never accepted to recognise that he had raped me. But I thought that over the course of a year he had gained some introspection."
Gisèle then turned to Dogan in court and stated: "You don't understand that this was rape. When will you admit that it's a crime? I am ashamed for you."
The court of appeal in Nîmes rejected Dogan's argument, and have extended his nine-year jail term to a decade after he was found guilty of aggravated rape last December.
50 other men were convicted of rape in the case.