Gisele Pelicot Prepares for Final Confrontation with Rapist Husband in Prison
Brave rape ordeal survivor Gisele Pelicot has revealed she intends to face her depraved ex-husband in prison to ask him one final, life-changing question: "Did you never feel sorry for me?" The 73-year-old, who was hailed as "the world's bravest woman" by the Mirror for speaking out during his trial and waiving her right to anonymity, says she needs to look Dominique in the eye one last time.
Five Years Since Police Station Walk-In
Gisele has not been alone with Dominique since they walked into a police station together five years ago, when his twisted web of deception began to unravel. He is now serving 20 years for repeatedly drugging and raping her, and inviting strangers into their home to abuse her while he watched. "He disgusts me, I feel dirty, soiled and betrayed," Gisele says. "I'll have to go and see him in prison, even though so many people have warned me not to. I need to."
She still has burning questions for the monster who was her partner for nearly 50 years: "When you looked at me in the morning, was there not a single moment when you felt pity for me? Did you never think: 'I must stop'? I will never forgive you for dragging our children and grandchildren into this suffering."
Additional Questions About Daughter's Abuse
Gisele also plans to ask him directly whether he ever abused their daughter, Caroline, which he denies. "I'll ask him all these questions. I need answers; he owes me that much," she states. "I will talk to the man I used to think I was married to. If he is still there, he will answer me. What does he have to lose, given that he is going to spend the rest of his life in prison?"
The Shocking Discovery and Trial
The couple met at 19 and married in 1973, with Gisele working as a secretary and Dominique as an electrician. They have three children and seven grandchildren. In September 2020, Dominique was detained in Mazan, southern France, for taking perverted "upskirt" photographs of women. A search of his phone and laptop revealed something even more sinister: countless videos of Gisele being raped and sexually abused.
When questioned, Dominique admitted inviting dozens of strangers to also rape Gisele after he drugged her. At the trial, he stood accused alongside 50 other men; 46 were found guilty of rape, two of attempted rape, and two of sexual assault.
Gisele remembers the moment she was told: "I ask for water. My mouth is paralysed. Our 50th wedding anniversary is coming up, and the memory of how we met is still clear in my mind. My brain shut down. The list of men who had abused me, some of them younger than my children, grew longer every week."
No Forgiveness for Rapists
Forgiveness for these men isn't an option for Gisele: "I heard a lot of apologies. Some of the rapists asked for my forgiveness. I refused to grant it. None of them had alerted the police to what was going on in our house, none of them had tried to help me."
Police uncovered hundreds of videos and thousands of pictures of the abuse. Gisele watched everything: "I saw a woman dead in the darkness. Her hands were bound. Her feet too. Her mouth forced open. I saw her suffocate and choke. I heard Dominique mutter 'easy does it'. I saw him rape me. Dominique, almighty in the cesspool of the human soul. My body, the dumping ground of his fantasies. It happened to me, but it wasn't me."
Years of Deception and Control
In the years leading up to Dominique's arrest, Gisele suffered memory blackouts and gynaecological problems, undergoing scans for a brain tumour and worrying about Alzheimer's disease. Dominique controlled her medical appointments and emotions: "He made the appointments. He controlled my emotions, and gave the answer to a question I had not thought of asking. He somehow ensured I brought up my health concerns as rarely as possible with my daughter and sons."
When her children found out what their father had done, they took his belongings to the rubbish dump. "Caroline spent the night at a psychiatric unit when details of the case were leaked to the press," adds Gisele. "Did she let out the screams that I held in, allowing herself to collapse as I did not?"
Family Relationships Damaged
The case has damaged the family, leaving cracks in the relationships between Gisele and her children. She says: "Dominique was nothing but a monster in the eyes of his children. It was heartbreaking to listen to them. I understood the shock, the pain, the suspicions. I understood the very foundations of our family were crumbling, but I did not want them to be destroyed. The children had been loved."
Now she admits struggling to come to terms with having to erase the life she shared with Dominique: "You don't get a second chance at life. If I had erased everything, it would mean I was dead. And had been for years."
Memoir and Moving Forward
Her memoir, A Hymn to Life, is out today, sharing her experiences in her own words. She says: "The story took on a magnitude that we hadn't expected. Every day, more foreign media outlets arrived to cover the trial. I had to embody it, set upright with my presence the tortured body that was being talked about all the time. Give it a voice, a face, consciousness, elegance too, all the things that rape seeks to destroy."
She hopes her story will pave the way for other women: "This story is no longer just about me. It has roused a deep, silent pain as old as time. It has sparked an extraordinary seismic shift. It fills me with relief to think that a woman who wakes up, unable to remember the night before might think of my story. She will think about what happened to me."
Gisele has found love again with retired Air France steward Jean-Loup, whom she met three months before the trial. "To fight the emptiness, I need to love," she says. Referring to her grandchildren, she adds: "This story is theirs too. I hope I'll be there to answer their questions in person. I will tell them that I kept the name Pelicot so that they need not be ashamed of it. Now I am able to fall asleep in the dark, a great victory."
