The prosecution has the floor in the Mazan rape trial. After eleven weeks of hearings, the time came for the prosecution’s indictments, starting with that against Dominique Pelicot, this septuagenarian who for ten years drugged, raped and had his wife raped.
The sentences that the representatives of the public prosecutor, Jean-François Mayet and Laure Chabaud, will demand will be scrutinized, as this trial has become a global symbol of the fight against violence against women – the international day of which will, by chance of the calendar, be marked Monday. And the main victim, Gisèle Pelicot, 71, achieved the status of feminist icon after refusing to allow the trial to take place behind closed doors, “so that the shame changes sides”.
Twenty years of imprisonment incurred by Pelicot
Before the professional magistrates making up the Vaucluse criminal court in Avignon, the attorneys general will begin with the “conductor” of this decade of rapes. Dominique Pelicot, common denominator of the 50 co-defendants recruited on the Internet to whom he had delivered his now ex-wife, previously sedated with anxiolytics, to their marital home in Mazan between July 2011 and October 2020.
It is difficult to imagine that they are not demanding the maximum sentence against him, twenty years of criminal imprisonment, on which all the others will depend. Dominique Pelicot has never hidden his responsibility, calling himself a “rapist”. “I am guilty of what I did (…) I ruined everything, I lost everything. I have to pay,” he said shortly after the start of the trial.
Verdict expected December 20 at the latest
But what sentences will the public prosecutor seek against his 50 co-defendants? Because even if most are prosecuted for the same facts, namely aggravated rape of Gisèle Pelicot, and therefore also risk twenty years in prison, the individualization of sentences is obligatory. For example, to distinguish repeat offenders – ten men came several times – from those who came only once to Mazan. These “everyman” range in age from 26 to 74 years old. Some claim that they were manipulated by Dominique Pelicot.
Our file on the rapes in Mazan
After the indictment, Wednesday afternoon or Thursday at the latest, the defense lawyers will have the floor. Dominique Pelicot’s lawyer, Béatrice Zavarro, will open the ball. His colleagues will then follow one another until December 13.
The court will then have a week to deliberate, with a verdict expected on December 20 at the latest.
