Raped under drugs "There is no silence here" - Gisèle P. does not want to be a victim
The rape trial in Avignon, France, is taking place in front of the public. The victim, Gisèle P., confronts her tormentors in court - and thus gains the ability to act.
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- For nine years, a man in France repeatedly drugged his wife and had her abused by numerous men.
- The mammoth trial in Avignon is taking place in public because the victim wants it that way.
- Gisèle P. wants the world to know what she had to go through.
- Her lawyers make it clear: only the perpetrators should feel shame.
The police investigation report suggests that Gisèle P. was the victim of 92 rapes in the presence of her husband. Dominique P. drugged her and had her raped by others between 2011 and 2020; 83 men are said to have been involved, as reported by the German news magazine "Der Spiegel", among others. But the woman seems determined to break out of her role as a victim.
Gisèle P. is turning the case, which is currently being heard in Avignon, France, into an emancipatory liberation. She listens to all the gruesome details and confronts her tormentors in the courtroom. For her, it's not just about surviving the trial. It was only in 2020, when everything came to light, that she herself learned the reasons for her physical and psychological injuries. And now she wants everyone else to know what was done to her.
Lawyer: "The shame belongs to the camp of the perpetrators"
"She is not ashamed of what happened. It is also a way of saying: the shame belongs in the other camp, in the perpetrators' camp," clarifies lawyer Stéphane Babonneau according to Der Spiegel.
Normally, such hearings are held in camera, but the court followed the victim's request to allow spectators, court reporters and journalists to attend. Gisèle P.'s children are also present at the trial. The defense's request to exclude the public on the first day of the trial, citing personal rights, was rejected.
"My client wants what she has experienced to be known, she doesn't have to hide," one of the victim's lawyers was quoted as saying on X by a journalist from French radio station RMC. What she experienced in abundance should be made public. "In this country, sexual violence is honored by silence," explains another lawyer. "There is no silence here, everything is made public, as demanded by the civil parties."
Gisèle P. about her husband: "He disgusts me"
Gisèle P. told the press that she had described her feelings to the judge at the hearing before the trial. "He disgusts me", she said about her husband Dominique. "I feel dirty, defiled, betrayed. It was a tsunami, I was hit by a high-speed train."
The public will continue to participate in this case, which is extraordinary in every respect, until the end of the trial on December 20. It is to be expected that further horrific details will come to light. Dominique P. has stored his heinous deeds on computers and hard disks, 20,000 photo and video files.
50 perpetrators have been identified
Gisèle P. will have to endure all this, as will the alleged perpetrators, who will not be able to escape the public eye. 50 rapists have already been identified, and the victim is among them.
They are men who come from the so-called middle of society, firemen, plumbers, computer scientists and family men. Those present are to hear how they try to justify themselves for something for which there is no justification. The husband and the other men face more than 20 years in prison if convicted.