Monster of Avignon accused of “drugging his wife and letting strangers rape his wife” complains about his …

September 9, 2024, 1:19 p.m. | Updated: September 9, 2024, 1:26 p.m.

A man accused of drugging his wife and soliciting men to rape her has told a court his life has been ruined by the trial and admits he would continue to do it.

Dominique Pelicot, 71, is accused of inciting strangers aged between 26 and 74 to come to his house in the French village of Mazan, near Avignon, to rape his wife Gisele Pelicot.

He is said to have filmed the attacks, which took place between 2011 and 2020.

The public prosecutor assumed that 92 rapes had been committed by 72 men.

A total of 51 men are on trial alongside Dominique Pelicot.

A prison psychologist told the court today that Pelicot had a “split personality”, lacked empathy and inherited the temperament of his father, who was described as a violent abuser.

She also revealed that Pelicot had said the abuse would have continued if he had not been arrested – and complained that his life had been ruined by the criminal charges brought against him, according to Mail Online.

Psychologist Marianne Douteau told the court that her client regretted his arrest and said the case had destroyed his life.

He believed that he and his wife could have had a happy marriage if his crimes had not been discovered.”

“He argued that the criminal proceedings had completely ruined his life.”

“He claims that if he had been arrested, everything could have continued as before.

He said: “Gisele would not have known anything, we would have continued to be happy,” she explained in court.

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Madame Douteau also recounted to the court several significant events from Pelicot's childhood and revealed that in an extensive interview with her in February 2021, he confessed to being sexually abused by a nurse at the age of nine.

In addition, Pelicot's father Denis was described as a violent abuser who forced his son to work from the age of 14 and took 80 percent of his income.

The family also took in a young girl who Denis reportedly abused.

The psychologist concluded that Pelicot had inherited a personality similar to his father's – angry, stubborn and impulsive.

She explained: “Dominique Pelicot comes from a deeply broken family in which young children were abused.”

“[Pelicot] has a double-edged personality; he is a patriarch, but also irresponsible and manipulative. Behind closed doors, he respects no boundaries.

“He has a split personality between the person he wants to be and the person he is.” He shows no compassion – but he is not inauthentic [in his expressions of love for his wife]' she said.

The psychologist explained that Pelicot admitted that he was very sexually demanding and was looking for sex on the Internet.

He told her: “I was on the Internet every day and constantly on websites that offered partner swapping.”

The psychologist said Madame Pelicot had been cut off from her support network in Paris after the couple moved to the south of France to retire in 2013.

From that point on, Dominique increased his abuse of his wife until his arrest in 2020.

Pelicot also told another psychologist who had previously interviewed him that he wanted to try swinging and she didn't agree, “so he gave her drugs.”

Madame Montagne said Pelicot insists he loves his wife, but added: “He sees his partner as an object to satisfy his sexual and narcissistic needs.”

“His wife is then a partial object and no longer the object of total love.”

The revelations were announced in front of his two sons, David and Florian, who also took the stand to testify against their father.

Recently, his daughter Caroline also took the witness stand and described her father as “one of the greatest sex offenders of all time”.

However, Dominique Pelicot himself was excused from today's hearing after his lawyer told the judge that he had had “medical problems” in the past 48 hours for which he had not received “appropriate treatment”.

The trial began on Monday and is expected to last until December.

A security guard caught her husband taking photos of women's crotches in a supermarket, prompting investigators to search Dominique Pelicot's phone and computer.

They found thousands of photos and videos of men apparently raping Ms Pelicot in her home while she was unconscious.

'Unbearable'

Yesterday, Gisele Pelicot described to the court how horrifying it was to discover that her former husband had systematically filmed the alleged rapes by dozens of men – and had saved thousands of images that police investigators later found.

“It's unbearable,” she said. “I have so much to say that I don't always know where to start.”

Shocked, she left her husband after the police showed her some of the pictures.

“For me, everything is falling apart,” she said in court.

“These are scenes of barbarism, of rape.”

She left with two suitcases, “everything that was left to me from 50 years of life together.”

Since then, she said, “I have no identity anymore… I don't know if I'll ever be able to rebuild myself.”

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Prosecutors allege the abuse began when the couple lived in Paris and continued when they moved to Mazan, a village in southeastern France. Pelicot took part in the rapes and incited the other men by using degrading language, prosecutors said.

Money was not involved in the arrangement. The men accused of being involved in the mass rapes include a journalist, a forklift driver and a firefighter.

The spectrum ranged from single to married to divorced. Because Dominique Pelicot recorded the alleged rapes on video, the police were able to track down the majority of the 72 wanted suspects over the course of two years.

In addition to Pelicot, 50 other men between the ages of 22 and 70 are on trial.

Several defendants deny some of the allegations against them and claim they were manipulated by Pelicot.

Over the next few months, the defendants will appear in small groups before a panel of five judges. Pelicot is scheduled to speak next week. Psychologists, psychiatrists and computer experts will also testify.