51 men on trial in horrific rape and drug case in France

Fifty-one men are on trial in Avignon, France, today for drugging and raping a woman over a decade in a sensational case that has shocked the country. The woman’s husband of 50 years, Dominique Pelicot, slipped sleeping pills into her meals. Police say he raped her while she was unconscious. He then began to persuade other men to rape her, filming the encounters.

The accused men are aged between 26 and 74 and have been seen socialising with members of French society, including truck drivers, soldiers and journalists. New York Timesone of the men also began to imitate Pelicot’s model and began drugging his own wife in order to rape her. Some of the men say they assumed the woman had consented or that her husband’s consent was all they needed for a sexual encounter; Pelicot has pleaded guilty.

The trial is rocking France, raising questions about sex crimes and predatory culture. Some lawmakers hope the trial will lead to changes to the definition of rape in French law — for example, to include language that sex without consent is rape, and that consent cannot be given when a person is impaired or under the influence of drugs. Many also wonder how doctors never suspected that something like this could happen. The victim, who experienced hair and weight loss and whose behavior led friends to fear she had Alzheimer’s, visited multiple doctors and gynecologists over the years seeking answers about her condition, one French lawmaker said. Times“There is a kind of naivety about predators in France, a kind of denial.”