In an unexpected development for a trial, investigating judge Gwenola Journot was questioned at length, Friday, November 8, at the Mazan rape trial. The one who summarized 31 volumes of instruction in a 370-page indictment order had to respond before the Vaucluse criminal court on the way in which the investigations were carried out, with defense lawyers citing possible failings.
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In such a sensitive trial, did Judge Gwenola Journot do her job badly? This is what the 30 criminal lawyers seized of this sprawling case wanted to know. Defense lawyers questioning a judge is an unusual move.
At the bar and for two hours, the investigating judge had to explain the way in which she conducted her investigation, at the request of an accused. Among the questions asked: whether or not, Dominique Pelicot delivered his wife to customers at motorway rest areas, as some of the accused had reported to investigators?
Or, what about the potential touching suffered by the couple’s daughter, Caroline Darian, by her father? Photomontages of her, naked and sleeping, were in fact found in her father’s computer files, and the forty-year-old still wonders if she too would not have been raped by the man she now calls her ” progenitor “.
Being able to hold a trial “ within a reasonable time »
Gwenola Journot answered the questions precisely. Dominique Pelicot’s rape of his daughter? She failed to obtain answers, the main accused having “ denied outright » : « We know that she was the subject of immodest images. On the two sleeping photos, we did not have an explanation from Mr. Pelicot. It’s kind of the only point where we didn’t get an explanation. », explains Gwenola Journot. Denials that Dominique Pelicot has maintained since the start of the trial on September 2.
To justify certain alleged shortcomings in her investigations, the magistrate explained that “ on a case of this magnitude, we could easily do ten years of investigation “. But the criterion that guided her was being able to hold the trial “ within a reasonable time “. Opened in November 2020, the investigation was closed in June 2023, with an indictment order of 370 pages summarizing 31 volumes of investigation, and which sent 51 men to trial.
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“ A frustration » as for the men filmed by Dominique Pelicot but not identified
What about the thesis according to which the accused were also drugged without their knowledge by Dominique Pelicot, as some put forward? “ I don’t remember having considered it, because none of the indicted does not appear sedated on the videos », Retorts the magistrate. Reactivated on this point, Gwenola Journot assures that, according to one of the accused himself, “ this thesis had been recommended to him by another indicted “.
His colleague Stéphane Babonneau finally mentioned these men filmed by Dominique Pelicot but not identified by the investigators. They would be between ten and twenty. Don’t you a taste of unfinished ? », he asks the judge.
“At one point, in consultation with the judicial police, we decided to stop the investigations. We had some people who we saw very blurry and we couldn’t get a photo of them “, replies Gwenola Journot, who adds: “ Yes, there is frustration, but we still think we have done the most we can. »
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