“I am a rapist like everyone in this room. They all knew, they can’t say otherwise,” he stated.
After a week of absence from court due to health reasons that led to his hospitalization, the main defendant in the case appeared at the Criminal Court of Vaucluse in Avignon, in southeastern France. This came after a group of experts examined Dominique Pelicot on Monday and determined that there were no medical contraindications for his appearance.
“She didn’t deserve it”
Between July 2011 and October 2020, Gisèle Pelicot was the victim of 92 sexual acts committed by her husband and other unknown men recruited online by him to rape her while she was unconscious under the effect of anxiolytics. “She didn’t deserve this, I admit it”, Dominique Pelicot said on Tuesday.
Pelicot was allegedly a victim of rape at the age of nine and forced to witness another during his adolescence. “I have been accused of many things. One is not born perverted; one becomes perverted.”, he added. “Even if it is paradoxical, I never considered my wife as an object,” he stated.
“I am guilty of what I did. I regret what I did, I ask for forgiveness,
even though it is unforgivable,” he declared. “You were wonderful, and I went over the limits,” he continued.
Sitting in the dock, the septuagenarian said he “was very happy with her. She was the opposite of my mother, completely unsubmissive. I was happy, I had three children and grandchildren whom I never touched,” he insisted.
The victim, Gisèle Pelicot, who was subjected to more than 90 rapes without her knowledge over several years, was called to testify during the hearing and confessed that it was “difficult to hear” her ex-husband’s confessions. “For me, it is difficult to hear what Mr. Pelicot has just said. For 50 years, I lived with a man
whom I never imagined could have committed these acts. I had complete
trust in this man”, she expressed.
Guillaume Horcajuelo – EPA
When asked about the videos of the victim being raped, Dominique Pelicot confessed there was “an element of perversion and addiction,” but he also said it was “an important security element” that allows for the identification of all those who participated in these acts.
The trial of Dominique Pelicot, which is shocking the country, began on September 2 and will extend until December 20. The testimony from this Tuesday is crucial for the case against the other defendants, aged between 30 and 74, who will begin to be tried in the coming days.