Dominique Pélicot will not appeal. “No, Dominique Pelicot has decided not to appeal the verdict against him“, affirmed this Monday on franceinfo Me Béatrice Zavarro, his lawyer. His 72-year-old client, sentenced to the maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, including two thirds of security, for having drugged, raped and had his ex-wife Gisèle raped for ten years, “will not appear before the Assize Court of Appeal, unless the General Prosecutor's Office decides to file a general appeal“.
“He decides not to appeal, because he believes that it would be a new ordeal and new confrontations for his wife, whom he always indicated in the debates that she was not his adversary, that she had never been his adversary”continues Béatrice Zavarro. “He doesn't want to subject her to what she rightly called an ordeal“, she adds, specifying that Dominique Pelicot “considers today that judicially the page must turn“.
Me Béatrice Zavarro estime”better to play on the execution of the sentence and to worry about Dominique Pelicot, his state of health, his age” et “to try to obtain from justice a modification of sentence“, rather than “take the risk“to appeal.”All this is premature, but we have the possibility of going into this area, rather than running an unnecessary risk on appeal with all the unknowns that the debates may offer.“, specifies the lawyer.
Despite this decision, a new trial will nevertheless take place, before an assize court composed of a popular jury: 17 of the 50 co-defendants have already appealed the verdict pronounced by the Avignon criminal court in the Mazan rape trial . The 51 accused have until Monday evening (midnight) to file an appeal. On December 19, at the end of almost four months of a trial symbolizing the fight against sexual violence against women, these fifty men were sentenced to sentences ranging from three years in prison, two of which were suspended at 20 years of criminal imprisonment.
His client will therefore not appear before the Assize Court of Appeal, “unless the general prosecutor decides to file a general appeal“, while 17 of the 49 other defendants present at the trial have already filed an appeal. “If by chance, the prosecution noted that this Monday evening, at the end of the appeal period, there were approximately 25 appeals, I wonder whether the debate would not be more coherent with the totality of the accused the bar, this is a question that the prosecution will ask itself“, explains Béatrice Zavarro.
For her part, Gisèle Pelicot did not “not afraid“a new trial and”she would face it“, declared one of his lawyers, Stéphane Babonneau, on December 20 on France Inter. “In any case, she is not afraid of it. That is to say, if it were to happen, she has already told us that she would face it – if she has the health, obviously, since she is a lady who is now 72 years old. But in any case, that doesn't scare her, that's what she told us.“, the lawyer then assured.
Asked about his client's state of mind at the end of this emblematic trial of sexist and sexual violence against women, Stéphane Babonneau declared that “she is very happy to go home. She is very relieved“.
“She doesn't want to be seen as an icon. She doesn't want to be seen as someone extraordinary. And in reality, he is someone who remains very simple and who has decided to try to live his life in the most normal way“, he added. “What she especially doesn't want is for the other victims to say to themselves that this lady has extraordinary strength, I couldn't do that.“, he insisted.
