Dominique Pelicot, “conductor” of the Mazan rapes, will not appeal his sentence to twenty years’ imprisonment. Fifteen of his co-defendants are requesting a new trial.
He will therefore not appeal. On December 19, Dominique Pelicot was sentenced to twenty years in prison for having drugged, raped and delivered his wife Gisèle Pelicot to strangers for ten years. Eleven days later, his lawyer, Me Béatrice Zavarro, confirmed that he would not appeal this sanction.
“Dominique Pelicot has decided not to appeal the verdict rendered by the Vaucluse criminal court,” she announced to AFP on December 30, 2024. An appeal “would force Gisèle to a new ordeal, to new clashes, which Dominique Pelicot refuses,” she added. She also declared that for her client, “it is time to put an end to this judicially.”
Dominique Pelicot, convicted of aggravated rape of his wife and that of a co-accused, also under chemical submission, and of recording images of a sexual nature of his daughter and his two daughters-in-law, therefore accepts the sentence which was pronounced against him. However, this extraordinary file is not yet ready to be closed. Indeed, more than fifteen of the 51 other defendants decided to appeal the verdict, despite less severe sanctions than expected. The lowest sentence, three years, two of which were suspended, was given to Joseph C. for “sexual assault in a meeting”. The heaviest, 15 years of criminal imprisonment, was pronounced against Romain V., who came to the Pelicots six times. The general prosecutor’s office, however, requested 18 years’ imprisonment.
A second trial should therefore be held during the year 2025. The framework of this one will be quite different from the previous one since the accused will not appear before a criminal court composed of magistrates, but before a popular jury, made up of a group of citizens drawn at random. Men who appeal are thus exposed to much heavier sentences. Stéphane Babonneau, one of Gisèle Pelicot’s lawyers, declared on France Inter that his client is “not afraid” of a new trial.