Dozens of men, including Gisèle Pelicot’s ex-husband, were found guilty Thursday of raping and sexually assaulting her in a historic trial that shocked France.
Speaking to journalists in the southern city of Avignon after the verdicts were read, Pelicot, 72, said the outcome of her case gave her confidence in a future where “everyone, women, men, lives in harmony, with respect and in mutual trust can live together. concept.”
Pelicot, who has become a hero to many in France for choosing to give up her right to anonymity and highlight the crimes orchestrated by her husband, added that she had fought the case with her children and grandchildren in mind “because they are the future. said a live translation by Sky News, the British broadcast partner of NBC News.
Gisèle Pelicot speaks to the media after her husband was convicted on Thursday.
Earlier in the courtroom, she watched as Chief Judge Roger Arata sentenced her husband, Dominique Pelicot, to 20 years in prison. He had admitted to drugging her until she became unconscious and inviting dozens of men to rape her over a ten-year period.
A further 46 men were found guilty of rape, two of attempted rape and two guilty of sexual assault in the high-profile case, according to Sky News. They ranged in age from 26 to 74 years and received sentences of three to thirteen years. Together they will serve more than 400 years.
About fifteen men had admitted to the offences, although only a handful of the accused men expressed remorse in the run-up to their sentencing.
In a side room, relatives of the defendants watched the proceedings on television screens, some bursting into tears and gasping as the verdicts were revealed, The Associated Press reported.
A sign reads “all the women on earth support you, thank you Gisèle” as people gather outside the courthouse in Avignone.
As emotions ran high, around 200 police officers were deployed in and around the courthouse, which was packed with relatives of the suspects, spectators and journalists from around the world. More than 150 journalists were accredited to cover the trial, which is seen by many activists as a turning point for women’s rights in France.
Pelicot said she respected the court and its decisions.
Although each of the 51 men tried in the case was found guilty, anti-sexual violence campaigners said outside court that their sentences fell short of what was required.
Marion Vogel, who runs a therapy program for domestic violence and other trauma victims in Mazan, the village where the Pelicots lived, called the conditions far too lenient and said: “Shame has not really changed the camps to involve the courts.”
“It was absolutely essential for this high-profile trial to set an example and deliver deterrent sentences so that the spirit of every man would be scarred and our society could finally evolve,” she added.
Muriel Réus, a radio host whose organization, Femmes Avec, helps victims navigate the justice system, also said it was “not a real punishment for most of these men.”
At an earlier hearing, it was revealed that Pelicot only learned of the horrors she endured when police launched an investigation into her husband after a security guard caught him filming up women’s skirts with his smartphone.
Investigators said they found videos on her husband’s devices that suggested she herself had been the victim of a major crime.
Although she could have remained anonymous, she called for the trial to be held in public and instructed her lawyers to fight for compelling video footage and other evidence to be played in open court.
She has previously said she did this in an effort to end the “macho, patriarchal society that trivializes rape.”
A court sketch of Gisèle Pelicot during the hearing in Avignon on Thursday.
Campaigners against sexual violence had hoped Pelicot’s case would mark a turning point in the fight against rape culture and the difficulties sexual violence survivors often face in seeking justice.
And in France, some of them told NBC News earlier this week that they hoped to transform a society where 75% of women said they were not treated equally in a 2024 government survey, and where 230,000 women last year reported that they were had done. have been victims of sexual violence.
“We have a real problem with French law,” said Magali Lafourcade, secretary general of the National Consultative Commission on Human Rights. “There are a large number of situations that do not constitute rape under French law [but] that in the eyes of the victim are rape.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
