The only man to appeal against his conviction for raping Gisele Pelicot has seen his sentence increased.
Husamettin Dogan, 44, was the only one to have maintained an appeal after the first trial last year of 51 men, including Pelicot’s husband Dominique Pelicot, in the case of mass sexual abuse.
On Thursday he was handed a 10-year prison term for having raped Ms Pelicot.
A lower court last year sentenced the 44-year-old to a nine-year prison sentence after prosecutors also requested 12 years.
Ms Pelicot told the court in the southern city of Nimes on Wednesday that Dogan had raped her and must ‘take responsibility’ for his actions.
An investigator on Tuesday said that images of the abuse found on Dominique Pelicot’s hard drive showed he had stayed at the house for at least ‘three hours and 24 minutes’ – not half an hour as he had claimed.
Footage shown to the court showed him penetrating an inert Gisele Pelicot.
Dogan avoided a maximum sentence of 20 years in jail, which would have put him on a par with Dominique Pelicot, who abused his wife and recruited dozens of strangers to do the same for almost a decade.
Antoine Camus, one of Gisele Pelicot’s lawyers, argued that Dogan’s sentence should be revised.
‘You don’t touch a sleeping victim,’ he said.
‘We hope that this jury will say loud and clear that in France, human rights are also women’s rights, that you cannot get consent from a husband, and that a sexual act imposed on a sleeping body is a rape,’ he added.
A panel of five judges issued the verdicts against Dominique Pelicot and his 50 co-defendants at the end of the trial last year in the southern city of Avignon.
This is a breaking news story. More to follow.
