The sensational trial of a decade of rapes in France has been officially suspended until Monday, pending the return of the main accused Dominique Pelicot, who is ill, a French court announced Thursday, even considering a pure and simple postponement of this case if Dominique Pelicot is “permanently unavailable”.
“Either Pelicot is there [lundi]and we continue. If he is not there for one, two or three days, we will extend the suspension,” first declared the president of the criminal court of Vaucluse (south) Roger Arata.
“But if he is permanently unavailable, the case will be postponed,” he continued, causing confusion among the defense lawyers and civil parties, while the initial schedule for this case, which began on September 2 and was supposed to be judged until December 20, had already been significantly delayed.
“Understand who can,” was the reaction of Mr.e Antoine Camus, one of the two lawyers for the civil parties, Gisèle Pelicot, the main victim in this case, and the couple’s three children.
If it is a postponement, then “everything has to be re-established, a schedule, the availability of the room, the court, etc. And what about those who are in detention? Because at that point, I can assume that there will be requests for release,” assured Mr.e Beatrice Zavarro, Dominique Pelicot’s lawyer.
This septuagenarian is on trial for having, for ten years, drugged his wife with anxiolytics and then raped her and had her raped by dozens of men recruited on the Internet.
Asked by AFP, the Avignon prosecutor’s office confirmed that in the event of an adjournment, “a new hearing” of the trial would be required at a later date.
Alongside Dominique Pelicot, 50 men, aged 26 to 74, are on trial in Avignon, most of them charged with aggravated rape, for which they face 20 years of criminal imprisonment.
Eighteen of these accused, including Dominique Pelicot, appeared in custody. Thirty-two others appeared free, the last one, on the run, being tried in absentia.
Everything is now suspended on the state of health of the main accused, 71 years old, visibly suffering since the beginning of the week and exempted from hearings for four days now.
“Shame changes sides”
In less than two weeks, the trial had already accumulated delays. While the daughter and two stepdaughters of the main accused, also victims – their father and stepfather had photographed them naked, without their knowledge, and had posted pornographic photomontages of them on social networks – had already been heard, his two sons had not been able to speak.
Likewise, Gisèle Pelicot, now the accused’s ex-wife, was to continue her testimony.
In announcing the suspension of the trial, President Arata specified that if the proceedings resumed on Monday, the couple’s children would be heard first, then Mrs. Pelicot again. It would then be the turn of Pierre P., the couple’s son-in-law, and finally Joël Pelicot, the accused’s brother.
Which would postpone the first speech by Dominique Pelicot himself until Tuesday.
Until then, he had only been heard on September 2, at the opening of the trial, to say that he acknowledged the facts and that his home was now the prison.
In the following days, the court could then move on to examining the facts concerning a first group of four co-accused, Jean-Pierre M., 63 years old, Jacques C., 72 years old, Lionel R., 44 years old, and Cyrille D., 54 years old.
“Group 2” of seven other co-accused, which was scheduled to start on Monday, i.e. week 38, will be postponed to week 46, starting on Tuesday, November 12, Mr. Arata has already warned.
On Thursday, the debates resumed in Avignon, in the absence of Dominique Pelicot and his family, represented only by their lawyers. And it was Annabelle Montagne, a psychological expert, who took the stand to finish the psychological portrait of the first four co-accused.
The facts concerning Mme Pelicot, at the couple’s home in Mazan (Vaucluse), had come to light after her husband had been arrested filming up the skirts of three women in a shopping centre in Carpentras (Vaucluse, south).
By searching his computer, investigators discovered this decade of rapes, photographed, filmed and meticulously captioned and archived by the accused.
Covered by media around the world, having become the symbol of the issue of rape under chemical submission, this trial is also taken as an example by feminist movements to relaunch the debate on the issue of consent.
And Mme Pelicot, who herself refused to allow this case to be judged behind closed doors, is becoming a figure in the fight against sexual violence.
Her stylized face, with the slogan “Shame changes sides”, is thus used for a call to demonstrate on Friday at 1 p.m. in Avignon, “against rape culture”. Many calls for demonstrations have also been launched for Saturday across France, in support of Gisèle Pelicot and all rape victims.