Why is Dominique Pelicot’s sentence for horrific crimes against his wife Gisele so short?

Emerging from a courthouse surrounded by journalists, photographers and her grandson’s hand on her shoulder, Gisele Pelicot spoke defiantly after her ex husband was jailed for 20 years for nearly a decade of abuse.

‘I’m thinking about all the other families affected by this case and the unrecognised victims in these stories that are often in the shadows – you share my struggle,’ she said.

The grandmother, 72, thanked her supporters, who cheered in jubilation was she left the courtoom, and added that she never regretted waiving her anonymity with the case.

‘I have faith now in our capacity to carve out collectively a future where women and men can live in harmony, in respect and mutual understanding,’ she said.

Her stoicism followed a three month trial where the court heard how her ex-husband, Dominique Pelicot, repeatedly drugged, raped her and invited dozens of strangers to abuse her from 2011 to 2020.

Earlier today he was given the maximum sentence of 20 years after a lengthy trial in Avignon, France. His lawyer has said he is considering an appeal.

The 50 other men meanwhile all received convictions, with 46 guilty of rape, two guilty of attempted rape, and two guilty of sexual assault.

The case has caused shockwaves across France, igniting a second ‘MeToo’-style movement and propelling Gisele into the spotlight as a feminist hero.

Following the sentencing, many have asked why the sentence for the campaign of terror he unleashed upon his wife is so short, questioning if this case marks a reckoning for France’s legal system.

What does French law say about rape?

French law defines rape as ‘an act of sexual penetration’ committed by ‘violence, coercion, threat or surprise’.

On average, France gives out 15-year sentences for rape. These can be extended to 30 years, or even life, depending on the damage and brutality.

But many have campaigned for the legal definition also be based on consent – something which has also been introduced in other European countries, including Spain and Belgium.

The legislation passed in those countries is referred to as ‘only yes means yes’ consent laws.

Many other countries have tweaked their legal definition of rape to include that it is sex without consent.

According to Amnesty International, 19 out of 31 European countries have changed their laws to include consent. They are: Belgium, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK.

But a plan to classify all non-consensual sex as rape across the EU was rejected by multiple governments in 2023.

‘The position of the Council cannot be interpreted as questioning the seriousness of the criminal offence as such or as a lack of ambition,’ Sweden’s Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer said at the time. ‘The fact that this offence is not included in the text is exclusively linked to reasons related to the legal basis.’

According to the law in Ireland, Spain, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Slovenia, Croatia, Greece and Cyprus, if a person does not give consent to have sex, it is classed as rape.

But over in Portugal, France, Italy, Netherlands, Austria, Czechia, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, a form of violence also needs to have happened to the victim for it to be classified as rape, or do not mention consent explicitly in the law.

In the case of Gisele, the abuse Dominique inflicted on her was so extensive, that prosecutors pushed for the maximum sentence possible for him to be kept behind bars until his death.

What has the reaction been to Pelicot’s sentencing?

The 20-year sentence has been both praised for bringing a rapist to justice and criticised for not being extensive enough.

Women rights campaigner Olympe Desanges told CNN: ’As a woman and as a feminist, I feel disappointed and humiliated by these verdicts.’

Mazan local Nedeljka Macan added: ‘I am shocked because the sentences are much shorter than what we had expected.’

Many women who live in Mazan, where most of the crimes against Gisele took place, still don’t feel safe.

Nedeljka Macan has lived in the town for more than a decade and told CNN: ‘I don’t feel at ease here in the streets. We don’t know if somebody who is in the next shop is one of these men. It changed everything.’

Women’s campaign groups meanwhile have felt emboldened by the case, and hope that this will lead to a shift in France.

Harriet Wistrich, Director of Centre for Women’s Justice, said: ‘This case has been a game changer in shining a light on the prevalence of rape culture in everyday society and in shifting the narrative from victim blaming to placing the shame on the perpetrators.

‘It has highlighted marital rape and the banality of rapists who can be men from any walk of life.

‘It has also highlighted the use of drugs to incapacitate victims and whilst the French law of rape does not rely on an absence of consent, in this case rendering the victim unconscious must have rightly been regarded as a form of coercion.’

Members of the French feminist group, Les Amazones, meanwhile said it had prompted a change in the relationships between men and women in France.

‘Men are starting to talk to women — their girlfriends, mothers and friends — in ways they hadn’t before,’ said Fanny Foures, 48, who joined other women from the feminist group Les Amazones in glueing messages of support for Gisele Pelicot on walls around Avignon before the verdict.

‘It was awkward at first, but now real dialogues are happening.

‘Some women are realising, maybe for the first time, that their ex-husbands violated them, or that someone close to them committed abuse. Men are starting to reckon with their own behaviour or complicity — things they’ve ignored or failed to act on. It’s heavy, but it’s creating change.’

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