The main defendant in the Mazan rapes was found guilty this Thursday of “aggravated rape” of his ex-wife.
This Thursday, December 19 at 9:30 a.m., the last day of the Mazan rape trial began. The main accused, Dominique Pelicot, who is accused of having raped and drugged his wife for 10 years, was sentenced to 20 years in prison, the maximum sentence for “aggravated rape”.
«The ogre of Mazan»
During these four months of hearing, dressed in a gray fleece and leaning on a cane, Dominique Pelicot remained seated in his chair, legs crossed, microphone in hand, seeming ready to hold a conference. From the first days of this extraordinary trial, the 71-year-old man claimed that he suffered from kidney disorders. Due to these health problems, the ex-electrician was absent at the start of the trial.
During his first speech, on September 17, Dominique Pelicot assured, in a weak and quavering voice, that he had “a side A and a side B» and immediately admitted his guilt. Questioned by the president of the court Roger Arata about his numerous paraphilic deviances, notably candaulism and somnophilia, he told the five magistrates of the Vaucluse criminal court: “we are not born perverse, we become one“. Before adding: “I was a grandfather like all the others… Until I slipped.”
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During their pleadings, the defense lawyers did not attack the civil party, but had criticized Dominique Pelicot for having influenced their clients, “simple men» which they consider to have been manipulated by “one of the greatest predators of the 20th century“. Criminal lawyers then described it as being “the conductor» of this file which “without him, would never have existed“, adorning him with a whole bunch of “titres». “A serial rapist worthy of Netflix” (Me Bouroumi), un “genius of manipulation” (Me Lemaire), “a pervert” (Me Berard). A “Minotaur”said he estimated Me Crépin-Dehaene, “half-man, half-bull, devoured by his impulses”with whom “the walls of Mazan’s house have become the walls of the labyrinth”where he “devour” Gisèle Pelicot. Me Christophe Bruschi had nicknamed him «the ogre of Mazan».
“They knew everything”
On several occasions, Dominique Pelicot assured that all his co-accused “knew everything” about what was happening at his home : «I am a rapist like those in this room. They knew everything. They can’t say otherwise», He claimed in September, when around thirty of these men’s lawyers pleaded for acquittal.
The trial will not have allowed us to go into detail about “to do B” by Dominique Pelicot: gray areas persist. The septuagenarian is in fact also indicted by the pole «cold-case» of Nanterre in two other unresolved cases, dating from the 1990s: the first for attempted rape, and the second for rape followed by murder.
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