The 50 men accused in mass rape of Gisèle Pelicot

They are younger, previous, burly, skinny, black and white. Among them are firefighters, lorry drivers, troopers, safety guards, a journalist and a DJ.

These are the 50 males accused of raping Gisèle Pelicot on the behest of her husband, Dominique Pelicot, 72, who drugged her for a decade with prescription sleeping tablets.

The reality they broadly characterize a microcosm of French society means they’ve been dubbed Monsieur-Tout-Le-Monde (Mr Everyman).

Next week they’re as a consequence of be sentenced, on the finish of a trial that began in September. If discovered responsible, collectively they face greater than 600 years in jail.

A couple of of them act defiant, however they largely look down as they reply questions from the judges, wanting up sometimes to catch their legal professionals’ eyes for reassurance.

Warning: You might discover among the particulars of this story disturbing

The 50 all come from cities and villages in a 50km (30-mile) radius of the Pelicots’ personal village of Mazan.

Some defence legal professionals have seen of their ordinariness a priceless line of defence. “Ordinary people do extraordinary things,” mentioned Antoine Minier, a lawyer representing three defendants.

“I think almost everybody could end up in a situation – well, maybe not exactly like this one – but could be susceptible to committing a serious crime,” he informed the BBC.

Prosecutors have based mostly their sentencing calls for to the courtroom on aggravating elements. How many occasions the defendants got here to the Pelicot dwelling, whether or not they touched Gisèle Pelicot sexually, and in the event that they penetrated her.

Joseph C, 69, a retired sports activities coach and doting grandfather, faces 4 years in jail for sexual assault if discovered responsible. That is essentially the most lenient sentence requested by prosecutors.

At the opposite finish of the dimensions, is Romain V, 63, who faces 18 years in jail. He was knowingly HIV-positive and but he’s accused of raping Gisèle Pelicot on six separate events with out sporting safety.

Prosecutors have been in a position to enter this stage of element as a result of, unusually for a rape trial, there’s a staggering quantity of proof, because the alleged assaults were filmed over almost a decade by Dominique Pelicot.

He has admitted all the costs in opposition to him and has informed the courtroom all 50 of his co-accused are responsible too.

All the video proof means not one of the males have been in a position to deny they ever went to the Pelicots’ dwelling. But the bulk vehemently contest the costs of aggravated rape that might incur hefty sentences.

France’s rape legislation defines rape as any sexual act dedicated by “violence, coercion, threat or surprise”; it has no reference to any want for consent.

Therefore, in addition they argue they can’t be responsible of rape as a result of they have been unaware Gisèle Pelicot was not able to provide her consent.

“There can be no crime without the intention to commit it,” mentioned one defence lawyer.

“My body raped her, but my brain didn’t,” insisted volunteer firefighter Christian L, in an instance of the convoluted reasoning supplied by among the males.

The one man of the 50 who will not be accused of raping Gisèle Pelicot is Jean-Pierre M, 63, who has been dubbed Dominique Pelicot’s “disciple”.

Having discovered the best way to drug his spouse to be able to abuse her, he did so for 5 years and admits it.

He blames his crimes on assembly Dominique Pelicot, who he says was “reassuring, like a cousin”. Prosecutors are searching for a 17-year jail time period.

Ahmed T, a 54-year-old plumber who has been married to his childhood sweetheart for 30 years, mentioned had he wished to rape somebody, he would haven’t chosen a lady in her 60s.

Redouane A, an unemployed man aged 40, argued that if he had got down to rape Gisèle he wouldn’t have allowed her husband to take movies.

Some additionally say they have been intimidated by Dominique Pelicot, who one lawyer informed the BBC, was an “abominable character”.

In tears, male nurse Redouan E informed the courtroom he was too frightened of him to go away the bed room. “Maybe you can’t tell from the videos, but I was really terrified!” he informed judges.

Others preserve they have been supplied drinks that have been spiked with medication and due to this fact can not keep in mind the encounter, though Dominique Pelicot has denied ever doing this.

The majority, nonetheless, preserve they have been manipulated or tricked by Dominique Pelicot, who satisfied them they have been collaborating in a intercourse sport with a consensual couple.

“They were put in a situation where they were scammed,” Christophe Bruschi, Joseph C’s lawyer, informed the BBC. “They were taken for a ride.”

But Dominique Pelicot has all the time mentioned he made it abundantly clear to the boys that his spouse was not conscious of the plot.

He gave them directions to keep away from waking her up or leaving traces that that they had been there – resembling warming their fingers earlier than touching his spouse, or not smelling of fragrance or cigarettes, he mentioned.

“They all knew, they cannot deny it.”

Since September, the 50 males have appeared, one after the opposite, in entrance of the courtroom in Avignon.

Usually in rape circumstances character investigations can take a number of days.

In this trial, due to the sheer variety of defendants concerned, they’ve been condensed into just a few hours at most. Their lives have been dissected at document pace, typically turning the courtroom session right into a litany of tales of abuse and trauma.

Simoné M, a 43-year-old development employee, mentioned he was raped when he was 11 by a household pal who employed him to take care of cattle within the French abroad territory of New Caledonia.

Father-of-four Jean-Luc L, 46, informed the courtroom how he and his household had left Vietnam on a dinghy when he was a toddler and lived in a refugee camp in Thailand for a number of years earlier than shifting to France.

Fabien S, a 39-year-old man with a number of earlier convictions together with drug dealing and sexual assault of a minor, was abused and crushed by foster mother and father from a really younger age. Like a number of others, he mentioned he solely realised throughout psychiatrist appointments ordered by the courtroom that his hazy, painful childhood recollections really constituted rape.

Many wives, companions and relations of the defendants have been known as as much as give character statements. They, too, scrambled for solutions as they sought to grasp how the boys of their lives might have ended up “caught up in this kind of situation”, as one lady put it.

“I was shocked, it doesn’t sound like him at all. He was the joy of my life,” mentioned the aged father of Christian L.

The firefighter can be being investigated for possessing little one abuse imagery, as are 4 others, and faces 16 years in jail. “Something must have happened, he must have become depressed,” his father questioned aloud.

Corinne, the ex-wife of 54-year-old Thierry Pa, a former builder, mentioned he had all the time been “kind” and “respectful” to her and their youngsters and appeared to go away the door open for a reconciliation him.

“When they told me what he was accused of I said: ‘never, that’s impossible… I don’t understand what he’s doing here at all.'” She believed it was the dying of their 18-year-old son that had led her ex-husband to fall right into a deep melancholy, begin consuming and ultimately make contact with Dominique Pelicot.

“I will always be there for him, whatever happens,” mentioned the ex-girlfriend of Guyana-born Joan Ok. At 27, he’s the youngest of the defendants and a former soldier within the French military.

He has denied raping Gisèle Pelicot on two events. While he knew she could be unconscious, he mentioned he had not realised she had not given her consent.

In floods of tears, a lady known as Samira mentioned she has spent the final three and a half years “looking for answers” as to why Jérôme V had gone to the Pelicots’ six occasions.

“We had daily intercourse, I don’t understand why he had to go look elsewhere,” she sobbed. She remains to be in a relationship with Jérôme V, who was working at a greengrocer’s on the time of his arrest.

He is among the few who’ve admitted to raping Gisèle, saying he favored the concept of getting “free rein” over her – however blamed it nonetheless on his “uncontrollable sexuality”.

Many former and present companions of the defendants have undergone assessments to see in the event that they too had been drugged like Gisèle. One lady mentioned she would “always have a terrible doubt” that the “respectful, thoughtful, sweet man” she knew had abused her too with out her information.

Since the beginning of the trial, a lot has been product of the necessity to discover a component that ties all these males collectively.

A standard denominator – beside the truth that all the boys went to the Pelicots’ of their very own free will – “remains nowhere to be found,” Gisèle’s personal legal professionals have mentioned.

But there’s one issue all of the defendants indisputably have in frequent: all of them made the aware alternative to not go to the police.

Firefighter Jacques C, 73, mentioned he had thought of it however “then life just carried on”, whereas electrician Patrice N, 55, mentioned he “didn’t want to waste the whole day at the police station”.

In the early days of the trial, Gisèle Pelicot was requested whether or not she thought it was respectable to assume the boys had been manipulated by her husband.

She shook her head: “They didn’t rape me with a gun to their heads. They raped me in full conscience.”

Almost as an afterthought, she requested: “Why didn’t they go to the police? Even an anonymous phone call could have saved my life.”

“But not one did,” she mentioned after a pause. “Not a single one of them.”