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A man has been found guilty on higher court review of sexually assaulting Gisele Pelicot after she was rendered comatose by her husband – and has had his incarceration period raised to 10 years.

Appeal Trial

Husamettin Dogan, 44, an unemployed builder, who had appealed his first conviction last year, underwent a retrial this week at the higher court in Nîmes.

A jury of nine jurors, accompanied by three judges, ruled against Dogan on Thursday of raping Pelicot in her home in southern France in the early hours of June 29, 2019.

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

We expect the court will affirm that in this nation, human rights are also women’s rights – that permission is individual, not transferred,” declared the victim's lawyer, her legal representative. “Consent is obtained personally and not by proxy from a spouse.”

Case History

The ex-husband, a notorious sexual predators in modern French history, was sentenced to 20 years in prison last year for incapacitating his wife at the time and soliciting multiple perpetrators to rape her in her home in the Provence village of the village of Mazan over a duration of nearly ten years of their union.

Fifty other men were found guilty in a widely publicized trial last year, and Dogan was the only man to contest his sentence. He was initially sentenced to nine years in prison, a sentence raised on Thursday to a decade.

The chief prosecutor, Dominique Sie, had stated he should serve 12 years, because he “stubbornly rejects to take any responsibility”.

Courtroom Details

Dogan had first sent the husband inappropriate pictures and then traveled an hour from his residence in the region to assault the victim, after telling his wife he was leaving, the testimony revealed.

The ex-husband, who was brought from solitary confinement in prison to temporarily give evidence at the hearing, told the court that the accused had known his wife had been “sedated” and he said to men by phone: “I want someone to violate my wife after I’ve rendered her unconscious without her knowledge.”

The courtroom became a central issue for a larger conversation on sexual violence norms in society as the defendant continued to assert he was not guilty and had not engaged in violation, arguing that because Gisèle Pelicot’s husband had allowed him into the bedroom, his conduct had been acceptable.

The panel in the higher court was shown recorded footage of the victim's unresponsive form, comatose and breathing heavily in a comatose state, while a grinning Dogan committed rape on several occasions over a duration of what police said was three and a half hours. The presiding judge said she had been at danger of death by asphyxiation. The state prosecution said there was absolute certainty that she had been unconscious and had not given permission.

Defendant's Statements

Dogan stated to the court the videos were simply “sex scenes” and rejected it was violation. He said what he did was “an intimate behavior”, not assault. He stated the court: “I am innocent of assault.” He said the victim's husband had invited him to the house, and therefore it was acceptable. He said he was influenced by the husband. “I attempted to cease,” Dogan stated to the court. “I continued because he convinced me.”

Asked if he wanted to make a final statement to the court, the defendant said: “I did not intend to injure that individual.”

Survivor's Statement

The survivor, who was supported upon exiting the courtroom each day by onlookers present to back her, said to Dogan in court: “You do not grasp. When are you going to recognise you raped me? It’s a crime to assault an unconscious woman. How could I have give you permission? Never.”

The victim, seventy-two, became an global icon after she waived her right to anonymity in the trial last year when she said: “Guilt ought to transfer.”

Legal Commentary

The prosecutor, addressing Gisèle Pelicot in court, said Dogan’s refusal to take blame showed that: “Guilt has not shifted. The public is possibly in the midst of that, maybe propelled by the public consciousness brought by the exposure of your situation.”

The prosecutor said the defendant's claims of blamelessness showed how normalized violence was still common in society as part of “archaic” forms of “gender-based power”. He said: “We need to change rape culture to a ethos of permission.”

The prosecutor said to the defendant: “While you refuse to admit it, it’s not just a woman, it’s an whole unpleasant cultural framework that you are endorsing.”

Biographical Details

Dogan was born in the country of Turkey and at the age of 5 moved to the nation of France, where his father worked as a building manager. The evidence indicated that his parent was abusive and that the defendant began consuming marijuana aged 10. When he was 17 he was stopped by police for dealing drugs and his parent kicked him out of home. He was incarcerated in prison for trafficking in his early 20s and had worked as a laborer but had faced periods of being unhoused.

He was wed and had a child with a genetic condition, who he was the principal carer for, as his spouse worked in a educational cafeteria. The evidence showed his spouse did not know he had regular extramarital activities beyond their marriage. His legal team said this was his way of coping with his difficult circumstances. Dogan had stated to a mental health expert that annually he engaged in commercial sex on his birthday. His lawyers stated to the court he had arthritis triggered by the pressure of the initial proceedings.