the day the court docket launched the primary video | EUROtoday
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“II will open the file night of February 24 to 25, abuse with Jacques… », warns the president of the Avignon Assize Court. It is around 4:30 p.m. on Thursday when the courtroom holds its breath. At the trial of the rapes in Mazan (Vaucluse), it is the first time that the acts filmed by Dominique Pélicot are broadcast. Gisèle Pélicot, the victim, has again agreed to their being broadcast, only on the court screens accessible to the media, not to the public. “Yesterday, they humiliated me, so today, I am the one who will humiliate them,” she breathes with determination during a suspension of the hearing.
What stands out is the noise. The loud night breathing that echoes. This inert physique on a mattress, in positive lingerie, eyes closed, mouth half-open. The dim lighting. But above all these snores, highly effective, which depart little doubt that the sufferer was asleep. During the printed, which lasted a couple of minutes, a few of the co-accused stare on the screens. Others have a look at their ft. And the accused within the dock, Jacques C., glances on the televisions together with his mouth open, wanting speechless. The actors within the trial had ready for these photographs. The attorneys have already taken observe of them. And but. When the stress eases, the journalists pout, have a look at one another disgusted, as if to say: did we actually simply see what we noticed?
ALSO READ Mazan rape trial: “I am a rapist like those in this room”We won’t danger describing these insufferable sequences intimately. No one needs to see them. However, the court docket – magistrates and never a jury – should, as a result of they’re imagined to make clear the case of Jacques C, 73, a pot-bellied retiree in a white shirt with grey hair and darkish glasses. He faces 20 years in jail and denies the rape of which he’s accused.
These photographs truly make clear far more than this specific case. They undermine the model of nearly all of the accused, who declare to not have been conscious of getting had sexual relations with a sleeping girl. In addition to the apparent loud night breathing, the disjointed posture and different bodily particulars are unmistakable. And we will thank Gisèle Pélicot for giving the press entry to verify this.
“I was a little slow on the uptake”
Before that night in February, the 2 Mazan residents acquired in contact on the Coco.fr web site. “She will have taken a sleeping pill and she will be asleep,” reassures Dominique Pélicot, who suggests to Jacques C. that he come and sleep together with his spouse at his place, with out mentioning any staged occasion. The very subsequent day (or the identical night, in accordance with Jacques C.), the assembly takes place. “I think I'm dealing with a libertine couple,” assures the pensioner. “But when you go there, do you know that she is asleep?” asks Mr. Antoine Camus, Gisèle Pélicot's lawyer. “Maybe she was a shy person…”, the accused believes he is aware of.
Dominique Pélicot greets her bare below a white T-shirt. Mazan's rapist offers him a couple of directions: to not make any noise or sudden actions to stop her from waking up. He then asks her to undress in the lounge, then brings him into the bed room and encourages him to the touch his spouse. “I feel that things are not what I thought they were,” thinks Jacques C., who will nonetheless take a number of minutes to grasp the scenario… “I was a bit slow to get going,” regrets the retiree who admits to touching, however not rape.
If he continued his actions, it was as a result of he was ready for “her to wake up”. “I did as I was told, and there was no reaction,” he continued, pleading “naivety”. I felt worse and worse, and I carried out fellatio on Mr. Pélicot as a result of I didn't wish to contact this woman anymore. This fellatio is an escape, not a satisfaction.” Suddenly, Gisèle Pélicot moved. Jacques C. took the opportunity to get dressed and leave the premises.
Why didn't he do it before? Dominique Pélicot's “stature” and “method of operating issues” had impressed him. “I'm bare on this room and somebody is operating issues,” he recalls. “Can you inform me what the risk was at that second?” asks Mr. Antoine Camus in surprise. “I didn't wish to upset him,” the accused simply replies. Gisèle Pélicot's lethargic state does not seem to have upset him to the point of worrying about it. “I'm not a physician, I'm not a primary aider,” Jacques C. defends himself, even though he worked as a professional firefighter for several years. “I used to be fooled, that's for certain.”
” I encourage your pardon “
“When I crossed the backyard, I assumed I’d report it,” he sighs, turning to Gisèle Pélicot. “The subsequent day, I’m going again to work early. And then, life goes on as normal…” He will never see the Pélicot couple again. “If I had heard the phrase medication, I’d by no means have come,” assures Jacques C. “It's a phrase that might have revolted me. But Dominique Pélicot instructed me: 'she took her tablet, she went to mattress'.” “From the start, he is aware of very effectively what he did, it's too straightforward to apologize,” Dominique Pélicot overwhelms him in the dock, contradicting part of his story.
Jacques C., a man “unanimously appreciated and dedicated to these round him”, according to the personality survey, was, among other things, a volunteer at the Restos du Cœur and a school bus driver for young disabled people. His lawyer insists on his good Samaritan side with emphasis. On their bench, Gisèle Pélicot and her daughter Caroline are seized by a nervous fit of laughter.
As if he had been waiting for this moment for a long time, the accused turns to them. “When I came upon what occurred, I used to be devastated,” he sniffs. “I’ll by no means recover from it. I apologize, and I hope your loved ones will recover from it.” Turned three-quarters, Gisèle Pélicot does not look at him. “Your apologies appear to lack depth,” Me Stéphane Babonneau attacks. “Do you might have a tool to measure it?” Jacques C. throws back at him.
The accused never stopped expressing his regrets, sometimes with a confusing clumsiness in light of the facts alleged: “I’ve at all times put ladies's pleasure first, within the act it’s an important,” he dared, or again: “I’ve a deep respect for ladies. If my ex-wife had been right here, she would say: “He loves women, in their entirety” “. Part of the room rolls its eyes. This sentence, which does not go down well with the civil parties, becomes inaudible after the broadcast of the videos. “Do you continue to imagine that you’ve at all times revered ladies after what we have now simply seen?”, Me Stéphane Babonneau reprimands him again. “Yes,” maintains Jacques C.
The screening of the videos greatly displeases the accused's lawyer, who deplores “sensationalism”. “We set up completely nothing on these movies!” he complains, as a result of in accordance with him, they don’t enable us to obviously set up the rape – solely the sexual assault. These transient sequences will nonetheless have confirmed one factor: the trial of the Mazan rapes is so insufferable that we will solely inform 1 / 4 of it.
https://www.lepoint.fr/societe/proces-des-viols-de-mazan-le-jour-ou-la-cour-a-diffuse-la-premiere-video-19-09-2024-2570715_23.php