At the Vaucluse criminal court,
Two and a half months of hearing and a daily immersion in “this house of horror”. In this one, the fifty co-accused of Dominique Pelicot “understood [en la quittant] that others had gone before and that others will still follow,” argued Antoine Camus, one of Gisèle Pelicot's two lawyers and the first to launch into the pleadings which concluded this historic trial. “However, not a single one called the police,” he underlined and regretted.
“Isn’t what Gisèle Pelicot is the victim of more of a mass rape? », questioned the lawyer who knows that “this criminal qualification does not exist”. “It is the banality of Hannah Arendt's evil which here takes the form of a rape of opportunity, of cowardice, these are the words of Gisèle Pelicot. »
Beyond this cowardice, put forward this Tuesday in her last speech by Gisèle Pelicot, her lawyer returned to the “political gesture of having renounced the closed session”.
« Since there was nothing to expect personally from this trial, it was necessary to open the room to as many people as possible, invite society to in-depth reflection, and make this debate the breeding ground for awareness. How, in France, in 2024, can we find within a 50 km radius, fifty individuals ready to sexually benefit from an inert body? » »
“You will die alone like a dog”
The lawyer then launched into the “immeasurable suffering” of Caroline Darian, the daughter of Gisèle and Dominique Pelicot who, despite the presence of two sexual photos of her found in one of her camcorders, persists to deny having taken them and even more so having “touched” him. “To show justice and truth for the civil parties is to not let it be said that Dominique Pelicot admitted everything and that he would have willingly lent his assistance to justice. The investigation shows that he never recognizes anything spontaneously, he only recognizes when irrefutable evidence is waved under his nose,” argued the lawyer.
“And the fact is that for once in a rape case, we have the sound and the image. These images which still haunt this courtroom, and for a long time to come,” supported Antoine Camus. But for her daughter, no confession, despite a final attempt by Béatrice Zavarro, Dominique Pelicot's lawyer, just before the pleadings. “You will die alone like a dog,” his daughter shouted to him, before bursting into tears, faced with this question which remains unanswered. “The perversion of Dominique Pelicot succeeded in separating the tears of his family,” noted Antoine Camus.
“Impairment of discernment” pleaded by 33 accused
And the lawyer then tackles “the mistreatment in the courtroom” that rape victims suffer. Gisèle Pelicot had to lay her sexuality bare, to show in a sense “that she was normal. And even if she was liberated, or unbridled, so what? “, questioned the lawyer, continuing: “If the defense is free, it says a lot about what we are. » Before his plea, 33 of the 50 co-defendants came to ask through their lawyer that “the alteration of their discernment” be taken into account for their verdict, which limits the sentences to two years in prison, accusing Dominique Pelicot to have also drugged them once they arrived at his home.
“But everyone in a certain way chose to go there, with some particularly explicit prior discussions. And even those for whom we have not found these conversations have made the choice to separate themselves from thought, from their free will,” said Antoine Camus. To have all made the choice to put their vision of the world and consent first: “Since it is the husband who opens the door, does his wife therefore consent? They chose to bet, without ever having discussed with her, that Gisèle Pelicot was consenting. »
All our articles on the Mazan rape trial
Finally, the lawyer concluded on the nobility of Gisèle Pelicot who “would have every reason in the world to be in hatred, to pit men and women against each other, to castigate male sexuality. But unlike her ex-husband, she chose to have her voice carried by two men [Antoine Camus donc, et Stéphane Babonneau]. This is not a coincidence. Despite what she suffered, she chose to transform this mud into noble material, to go beyond the darkness of her story to find meaning in it. » That of making his trial a platform, a platform against this “macho and patriarchal society which trivializes rape” and which Gisèle Pelicot had denounced in her last speech.
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