A Frenchman is facing trial for allegedly orchestrating the s3xual abuse of his wife by allowing dozens of men to rape her after drugging her for over a decade.
The French pensioner went on trial on Monday, accused of drugging his wife and allowing scores of strangers to rape her over the course of a decade—a case that has shocked the nation.
The 71-year-old, a former employee of France’s power utility company, EDF, recruited 50 men online to carry out the assaults.
These men, aged between 26 and 74, are also standing trial in the southern city of Avignon. Police identified a total of 92 rapes committed by 72 men, 51 of whom have been identified.
The victim, a 72-year-old woman, was reportedly so heavily sedated that she was unaware of the abuse.
According to her lawyers, she only discovered the horrific acts in 2020, and the trial will force her to relive these events for the first time.
“This trial will be a terrible ordeal for her,” said her lawyer, Antoine Camus, adding that she has “no recollection” of the abuse.
The woman, supported in court by her three children, could have requested a closed trial but chose not to. “That’s what her attackers would have wanted,” Camus explained.
The investigation into the defendant, Dominique P., began in September 2020 when he was caught by a security guard secretly filming under the skirts of women at a shopping center.
Authorities later found hundreds of photos and videos on his computer, depicting his wife unconscious, often in the fetal position. The images revealed numerous rapes taking place in the couple’s home in Mazan, a village near Avignon.
Dominique P. confessed to administering powerful tranquilizers, particularly Temesta, to his wife. The abuse began in 2011 when the couple lived near Paris and continued after they moved to Mazan in 2013. According to prosecutors, Dominique P. participated in and filmed the rapes, encouraging the men with degrading language.
He claimed that all participants were aware that his wife had been drugged without her knowledge. An expert described her condition during the assaults as “closer to a coma than to sleep.”
The accused include a diverse group of individuals—a forklift driver, a fire brigade officer, a company boss, and a journalist, among others.
Some were single, others married or divorced, with most participating only once, though a few took part multiple times. They have defended their actions by claiming they were simply helping a libertine couple fulfill their fantasies. However, Dominique P. insists that all involved knew his wife was drugged.
Dominique P., who claimed he was raped by a male nurse at the age of nine, is also facing charges in connection with a 1991 murder and rape, which he denies, and an attempted rape in 1999, to which he confessed after DNA testing. Though experts have stated that he does not appear to be mentally ill, they noted in documents seen by AFP that he harbors a need to feel “all-powerful” over the female body.
The trial is expected to continue until December 20.
YOU MAY ALSO READ: How Canadian-Nigerian woman lands in trouble after threatening to kill, poison fellow Nigerians