A French court on Thursday convicted a man, Dominique Pelicot to 20 years in prison for contracting over 50 men to rape his wife after he drugged her in a trial that lasted over three months.
Pelicot, who had already confessed to the crimes, was found guilty by the court in the southern city of Avignon.
“Mr Pelicot, you are found guilty of aggravated rape of Gisele Pelicot,” said the presiding judge of the criminal court in Avignon, Roger Arata, adding that his sentence would be announced later in the morning.
Pelicot, 72, admitted to drugging his ex-wife, Gisele Pelicot for almost a decade so that he and strangers he recruited online could rape her.
Gisele, also 72, has become a feminist hero at home and abroad for refusing to be ashamed, waiving her right to a closed trial, and standing up to her aggressors in court.
Alongside her ex-husband, 50 other men between the ages of 27 and 74 have been on trial, including one who did not abuse her, but raped his wife with Dominique Pelicot’s help.
LEADERSHIP recalls that on November 25, prosecutors requested the maximum sentence against Pelicot for aggravated rape.
It is widely expected that he will receive the full 20-year term but considerably more uncertainty surrounds the sentencing of the other defendants.
The prosecution has requested 10 to 18 years in prison against the 49 defendants also charged with aggravated rape. One of these accused is on the run and being tried in absentia.
One more accused, facing the lesser charge of groping, risks up to four years in prison.
Thirty-two of the accused are attending the trial as free men while the others, including Dominique Pelicot, were remanded in custody.
Earlier Thursday, Gisele Pelicot arrived at the courthouse smiling and cheered by crowds of supporters and feminist activists waiting outside who chanted her name and slogans like “Justice for Gisele” and “Shame has Changed Sides”.
“Rape affects women all over the world, that’s why the whole world has its eyes on what’s going to happen,” said Ghislaine Sainte Catherine, one of the members of the Amazons of Avignon feminist collective.
Her children David, Caroline, and Florian arrived half an hour earlier, entering the courtroom alongside a group of men accused of raping their mother.
“We came with our things for prison,” said one of them, pointing to the sports bags on the ground.