Transcript of 'The Interview': The Woman at the Center of the French Rape Trial That Shocked the World

From the New York Times, this is the interview. I'm Lulu Garcia-Navarro. It is one of the most heinous sexual abuse stories in history. Giselle Pelicot was drugged and raped repeatedly by the person she trusted most in the world, her husband, Dominique Pelicot, who invited dozens of men into their bedroom to also rape her while she was heavily sedated. Giselle discovered what had to her in 2020, after Dominique Pellicot was caught filming up women's skirts at a local supermarket. After police arrested him, they found thousands of videos and images of his wife being violently assaulted by at least 70 men. Many were stored in a digital folder titled Abuse. Four years later, France's largest ever mass rape trial began. Even then, we might have never known Giselle Pellicot's name, but in a decision that shocked the world, she waived her right to anonymity and the trial became public. That made her a global icon and inspired a movement of women who marched in demonstrations all over France to demand change to the country's consent laws. Still, despite her Fame, Giselle remained in many ways an enigma. Outside of the trial, she'd never sat down to tell her story until now.

She's written a new memoir called A Him to Life: Shame Has to Change Sides. Over an extended interview last month in Paris, her first with an American media outlet, Giselle spoke with me about the early years of her marriage, the toll the abuse and trial took on her and her family, and how, despite everything she's been through, she's found love and a sense of peace again. What you'll hear is a voiceover in English of Giselle's original French answers. Here's my interview with the extraordinary Giselle Pelicot. Madame, I am so happy to have you here today. Your book is gripping. It is heartbreaking. It is beautifully written. This is the first time that people will be able to have heard from you personally, your own words, your own story. How are you feeling sitting down and discussing this really in a public way for the first time?

First, I want to say that when I When I read this book, I wanted it to be useful.

It also allowed me to look inward at myself, to take stock of my life, and to try to rebuild myself from the ruins. When you hear the When you look at the facts of the trial on September second, 2020, you see this woman and wonder, how is she still standing after all she has been through? I needed to convey that despite all the to the trials I've been through. I am still a woman who stands tall.

To start before we talk further, how would you like me to refer to your ex-husband?

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I'd like to start your story by talking about the period of time before you knew what was being done to you. You had retired to the southeast of France and called Mazin. What person were you then? How would you have described yourself?

I was a woman who retired at just over 60 years old.

I had always worked raise my children, and had a very active life, and I thought I would have a happy retirement with Mr. Pelicot.

The Mazin house was a place where we could have friends and the children over during the holidays. We always called it the house of happiness. We weren't far from Montventou in Les Baux de Provence. We had the cicadas, the olive trees, the sun. It also had a swimming pool. As soon as the grandchildren arrived at the house, they would put down their things and jump in. I enjoyed watching them grow up. I was living a fulfilling, happy life. Of course, like all couples, we had difficult times. Life is not always smooth sailing, but I had this joy de vivre with Mr. Pelico. All our friends and family liked him. He was always ready to help. He was athletic. I only knew a kind and caring man, which is terrifying.

A lot of this book seems to be an attempt to understand who you actually married and also what you actually felt during that time. Can you describe how you, Mr. Pelico, first met each other when you were teenagers?

I met Mr. Pelico in July of 1971.

We were two 19-year-old kids. We had started working already. We earned our money. When I met him, he was this shy boy, always blushing, and his family life was a bit more complicated than mine. His father was a tyrant, very authoritarian, and he had to give his parents every penny that he made.

When he was younger, he was raped in the hospital.

Then when he was 14, he was forced to watch a gang rape at a construction site. He never went to therapy, and his family didn't help him either. We decided to get married really young. My father disapproved. He had remarried, and my stepmother wasn't very nice, and my only desire was to run away and live a happy life. I believed I could be very happy with Mr. Pelico, and that's what actually happened. We moved to the Paris suburbs. We didn't have much at first. We didn't have a lot of money, but we were in love, and that's what was important. We both wanted to start a family. Of course, it's complicated now. They say love stories don't end well, and mine ended badly, 50 years down the road. But still, I hold on to the good moments from that life.

As far as we know, Mr. Pelico seems to have started abusing you in 2011. But in 2013, when you retired of Mazin, things accelerate. This is when you start experiencing, essentially, unexplained memory losses. Can you tell me about the blackouts?

The first time, the episode of 2011, I have no memory of it.

It came back to me later in front of the investigating judge when I learned that my first rape took place on July 23rd, 2011. I remember waking up in the night and I realized that something was wrong with Mr. Pelico because I said to him, What are you doing? Leave me alone. And since I was sedated, not enough for him though, because I think he was already starting to experiment with the doses he was giving me, I went back to sleep and woke up very late the next day around 6: 00 PM.

And I asked, How come you didn't wake me up?

And he said, You were tired. I let you sleep. And I It was a little intrigued that I could sleep so long. That episode just stuck in the back of my mind. I didn't think about it again, but the same thing happened again in September 2013. Except this time, I didn't wake up during the night. I realized the next day when I put on the pants I had worn the night before, there were stains on them, like bleach spots. I thought it was strange. What had I done? I couldn't remember the night before, and I asked Mr. Pelicot about it. He was in the garden at the time, and I said to him like this, Doumet, my nickname for him, You're not drugging me, are you? As if I was asking him what he wanted to eat or if we were going for a walk that afternoon. In other words, my subconscious asked the question, but as if I were joking. Then to my great surprise, he cried. He said to me, Do you realize what you're saying to me? What are you making me out to be? His response completely threw me off balance.

And I said, I'm sorry. I apologize. I don't know why I asked you that. And after that, I never mentioned it to him again. But in fact, I was right. My subconscious had detected something, but I It was striking to me in reading your book, how dependent and isolated you were.

You were no longer working after you retire. Your children didn't live nearby. You didn't drive because you were having increasing blackouts and you were worried about them. Mr. Pelico took you to the doctors to make sure he could oversee what treatment you were getting. How was he behaving towards you during this time?

I always thought this man would protect me.

When I started Having these lapses, I told him about them, of course. I told him, I think I need to see a doctor because I think I have something serious. He said, I'm sure there's nothing wrong with you. You're going to your children for nothing. I told him I wanted to know for sure. The first time, he took me to the neurologist. He had made the appointment and he came with me, of course, because I was afraid of the diagnosis. I always remember the neurologist's attitude. I told him I was very worried because I couldn't remember the previous day, watching a movie, brushing my teeth, everyday things I did just before going to bed. He had me do some clinical tests, like standing on one leg to see if my balance was still good. And once I sat back down in front of him, he said, You know, I think you had a mini stroke. It can happen once in a lifetime. So don't worry, it's absolutely nothing. So I leave with Mr. Pelico, and in the car, he says to me, You see, I told you there's nothing wrong with you. Fine, but the blackouts continue.

And then I told him that something was wrong. I made another appointment with another neurologist. She says to me, Madame, I think that... She doesn't tell me, she tells my children, You're going to have to prepare yourselves because I think your mother has all the early signs of Alzheimer's disease. What was I supposed to do with all this? I felt doomed. I kept thinking of my mother, the memory of my mother who died very young. I was preparing for the end. I thought I had very little time left to live. The terrifying thing, too, is Mr. Pelicot even accompanied me to the gynecologist because I had gynecological problems. Many people have asked, How could she not have known. But that's the reality. I trusted him so much that I couldn't imagine that this man was manipulating me because he always said I was the love of his life. How can you treat the love of your life this way? It's unthinkable.

Let's talk about the moment when everything changes for you and you get the information about what has really been happening. In 2020, Mr. Pelicot tells you that he's been caught filming Up women's skirts at the local supermarket. Were you shocked?

When When Mr..

Pelicot revealed to me what he had done in the Carpentras supermarket, I found it hard to believe because he had never done anything underhand it to me. In 50 years, I had never seen anything. He was not a man to make jokes about women or behave inappropriately toward them. When he told me what he had done, I didn't understand. I said to him, What got into you? Why did you do that? He said, Well, you weren't there, and I had an impulse. I said, This time, I'll let it slide since he had never done anything like that before. I told him, I'll help you. You need to get help. You need to see someone because you can't go on like this. You're going to apologize to those women because they need reparation, too, because what he did was also a form of violence. I told him, For now, I'm forgiving you, but I'm warning you there won't be a next time. Next time, I'll leave. And he replied, Don't worry, I've learned my lesson. I won't do it again. I believed him because I didn't know what would happen to me shortly afterwards. And that's what's terrifying for me to think about even today, how he could look me in the eye and talk to me like that.

Like the last breakfast that day, I found out the truth. We had breakfast as if nothing had happened.

That last breakfast that you had together was two months from the time that he told you he'd been caught filming because it took that long for the police to call you both into the station. You initially assumed that it was about the filming, that that's why you were both going to the police station. But this is when you learn what actually had been happening to you. I know this is an incredibly painful moment, but could you take me into it? When they sit you down, what did they tell you and what do you see?

I thought we were going to talk about the two photos he took in the store in Carpentras. Mr. Pelicot went in first. I was called maybe half an hour later. When I go up to the first floor to meet Lieutenant Perret, I arrive at his office and I expect to find Mr. Pelico there. But Mr. Pelico isn't there, so I think to myself, maybe that's normal. He wants to know if Mr. Pelico really told me the whole truth. I sit down, and since it was COVID, we're wearing masks. We're sitting a little further apart, and he tells me to take off my mask, and he starts the interview and asks me questions. My first name, my last name, my parents' ages. And I admit, I start to wonder why all these questions. Then the questions become more and more specific.

Can you describe your husband? I said, Yes, of course.

He's a good man, attentive, caring. We've been together for 50 years. I've never had a problem with Mr. Pelico except for this incident with these two people, and I don't understand how he could have ended up like this. Then Then I see that he starts to change the tone of the interrogation and asks me if I practice swinging with Mr. Pelico.

At that point, I start to wonder, what is he getting at?

Why is he asking me this question? I say to him, Listen, of course not. At my age, I'm a modest woman. I never go to those clubs, and besides the idea of another man touching me is unthinkable. Then I his face start to change, and he has a pile of files next to his desk. He says to me, Mrs. Pelico, what I'm about to tell you is not going to please you. I'm really starting to worry. My heart is racing, and I say to him, But what's going on? He says, See the pile over there? And he starts to open a folder. He starts to show me a photo. He says, Do you recognize recognize yourself in this photo? And of course, I didn't recognize myself because I was with a man I didn't know who was raping me. And so I said, But no, I don't know this man.

And I began to think to myself, No, it's not me.

Maybe he's mistaken because I don't have my glasses on and I can't see very well. He shows me a second photo, which is pretty much the same, and he says, That's you there. And I say, No. And I really start wondering. And he says, This is your room, Mrs. Spediko. These are your bedside lamps. We search your home. These are your belongings. And at that time, I think my brain went into dissociation. He wanted to show me videos, and I said, No, I can't do that. I can't. He told me, Your husband is in police custody. He won't be leaving with you. You need to know that you have been raped many times. We have arrested 53 individuals, and I will later learn that there are 20 or 30 who have not been arrested.

And he tells me that I have been raped about 200 times. And I say, But that's not possible.

Then I asked for a glass of water because I can't talk anymore. They had a psychologist there. They had planned everything. All I want to do is go home because everything they've told me is impossible. It's not possible. It's not true. I am in another world, basically. And so the psychologist arrives. She talks to me, but I can't hear her. Lieutenant Perret takes me home with one of his colleagues. And when I got home, he said to me, Call a friend. Don't stay here alone because you're in danger. Because they knew that not everyone had been arrested. So I called a friend, but I still don't believe it. It was like a bad joke. It's It's not like I'm in denial, but just total disbelief. And my friend arrives, and when she sits down in the living room and asks what's going on, I tell her, I'm going to tell you something. I find it hard to believe, but here it is. Dominique has been arrested. He's in custody because he raped me and had me raped. I think that's the first time that I said the word. It took me almost five hours to absorb it, but I said the word rape to my friend in that moment.

It is unimaginable.

This man that you had been married to for 50 years, suddenly you get given this information. What was it like to see that unconscious version of yourself?

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It's devastating. I'm a rag doll. It's as if I've come out of surgery because I'm completely anesthetized. When you see what they're doing to me, How is it possible that my body couldn't feel anything? So it's true that it really was anesthesia. Fortunately for me, I have no memories because I think I would have killed myself afterwards. I couldn't have survived that. But fortunately, I told myself that it wasn't me. It was me, but it wasn't me, that woman. Mr. Pelico had disguised me. I looked like a sack of potatoes. I had no soul, nothing. That woman wasn't me. That's probably what saved me, telling myself that.

You write that a wave of shame swelled up inside me after this revelation. Can you talk me through why you felt shame at that moment?

I think all victims feel this shame.

You feel dirty, you feel degraded.

There's nothing human about it. I spent hours and hours in the shower trying to wash away this filth, this dirt that makes you feel dehumanized.

I'm going to quote something that's a little graphic. Is that okay? All right. For listeners who may not have followed the trial, and forgive me, I just want to give a few examples of the scale of the abuse that you learned about in the months that followed this police station visit. Mr. Pelicot was finding men online to rape you while you were heavily drugged, and then he would meticulously film those encounters. This was happening constantly. After your children came for dinner while you were on vacation. There's one moment that you describe in the book where a crown had come loose in your mouth. You write that it was because of, and I'm quoting from your book here, the violence of penises being repeatedly forced into your mouth. I quote from this because you are being so clear about the unimaginable things that were done to you.

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When that crown started to move, I was eating breakfast, and Mr. Pelico is in front of me. Because of COVID, we can't see the dentist, and I can't get it out. But I know it's going to fall, and I'm afraid I might swallow it. I asked Mr. Pelico, Could you help? He said, Yes, and went to get some gauze to remove the crown. I think to myself, How could it have given way? Because the day before, it wasn't loose. And he says to me, You must have bitten down on something. When I discovered the videos showing the violence these men inflicted on me in my limp mouth, they have to hold my head because my face is falling. I have no muscle tone. And you see this individual doing what he's doing, and Mr. Pelico doesn't even react. There is no empathy, no pity for this woman who is there, completely dead in her bed. It was incredibly violent. They spared me no humiliation..

I'm sorry..

Do you want to take a moment?

No, no, no.

I'm sorry for what happened to you.

People need to It's very important that people know..

It's shocking. I know.

It's shocking. As you're processing all of this, you learn that the police have also found pictures of your daughter's in law in the shower and of your daughter, Caroline, asleep in underwear that she says she doesn't recognize. All three of your children are having to deal with what their father has done. Caholine ends up having a breakdown. She ends up being hospitalized. It must have been so difficult to balance being I think that suffering doesn't necessarily bring a family together.

You need to understand it's like an explosion that blows everything away. We try to recover each in our own way and in our own time also. It's true that what Caroline went through is extremely painful. I'm deeply moved by her suffering because this lingering doubt is an inescapable hell. There are no answers. There are those two photos of her sleep that open up a lot of questions, but I don't have any answers, and Mr. Pelico didn't give her any answers either. I hope one day he feels remorse and finds it in himself to talk to his daughter. I know she's in a lot of pain. I spoke to her this morning. We talk on the phone almost every day now. She's suffering, and for a mother, that's really hard. It's true, it's complicated Caroline. She's 47 years old now. What she wants is to be recognized as a victim because today she's not officially a victim. He's been condemned for taking all these images, but he was never condemned for what he really did to Caroline.

You mentioned that pain doesn't bring a family together. It can often tear it apart. It just strikes me that when you were talking about how happy you were and what a family person you were, how proud you were of being a parent and a grandparent, to have your family pulled apart in this way must have been very painful.

It's true that most of my life revolved around my family, and that's what's terrible, because all those memories, what do you do with them? You can't rewind your life.

In the book, you write about how you have struggled to reconcile your happy memories with the knowledge you have now about the reality of who Mr. Pelico was. You write, and I'm quoting here, If the last 50 years of my life were taken away from me, it would be as if I had never existed. I would be dead. I mean, that's a very complicated idea. Can you explain how you've tried to work through that?

It might seem strange, but it's a lot like grieving. You grieve for the life you had. I couldn't erase all of the good memories because otherwise, I'd lose everything. My existence would be void. I held on to those good memories. It's like sorting your laundry. You separate clean and dirty clothes. You sort things out, and I sorted things out. I set the dirty laundry aside, and I kept everything that was clean. After the break, the trial.

This all leads us up to the trial itself. In France, victims of sexual violence have the right to have their identity protected. But you make this extraordinarily brave decision to waive your anonymity, allowing an open proceeding where members of the press, members of the public, can see what is going on inside the courtroom. Can you take me into that decision, how you realize It took me four years to make this decision because I wanted a close trial.

Of course, I didn't want to be for people to know who I was. I wanted this trial to be close with just the assailants and their lawyers. One day, my daughter told me, Mom, you're doing them a huge favor. Think about it.

It took me four years, but one day I went on a walk by myself and I realized she was right.

I told myself, Actually, to carry this shame with us adds insult to the injury because you keep inflicting that pain on yourself. Fighting that shame on an individual level, rejecting it for myself, also meant working for the collective. Actually, I knew I made the right call when on September second, I walked into this hearing room with those 51 defendants and their 45 lawyers. The journalists were already in the room, but they knew they would have to walk out soon. Everybody knew it was a close trial, so no one expected what was about to happen. When the presiding judge walked in and said, Ladies and gentlemen from the press, this is a closed hearing. Please see yourselves out, my lawyer stood up and said, You're In honor, our client waives her right to a close trial. Then I saw the way the defense was looking at me. They were staring like, She dare to do this? The defendants were staring too defiant with something in their eyes that was dreadful for the victim. Everyone was staring right at me, and I told myself, Hang in there, you're going all the way. I held on, but They made me pay for it.

They called me an accomplice. They said I was a woman who had consented. I was suspected. They tried by all means to convince the court that if she's here, she must be responsible for what happened. Our clients are not guilty of what they did. I can assure you that I didn't flinch not once until the very end I held on. It takes guts. You have to be strong..

What was it like to see all those men in the courtroom day after day? Did your attitude towards them change over time?

When I was entering, the first time in this The first time I walked into that courtroom, I discovered their faces because I didn't know them.

I had never met them because I was always, I don't like the word sleep. I was anesthetized, unconscious. When I discovered their faces, ages 22 to 70, it was really unbelievable to think those people came into my bedroom. They came in there to rape me. They were saying it hadn't been raped. To them, it was the husband had consented. He had said, You can come in, because they had logged onto a website, coco. Fr, in a chat room called Without Her Knowledge. They knew exactly what they were here for, but they had a way of discounting their guilt, and they saw themselves almost as innocent.

I've This was tough for me, too, facing their gaze.

Once, one of the accused staring at me, and he kept staring at me, wanting to force me to look down. But I just kept staring back until he lowered his eyes, and he finally understood I wouldn't give in. They all tried to break me, all of them, and their lawyers were asking questions to destabilize me, humiliate me. That's when I started to raise my voice to put an end to this masquerade. Fortunately, I was lucky to have all this evidence, the pictures, the videos. Every time they were asked, Did you receive Madame Pelico's consent? Most of them didn't even know what that meant. They said, Well, no. Did you rape Madame Pelico? They said, No, I didn't rape Madame Pelico. They were shown the videos because what they were saying was that Mr. Pellicot had been pressuring them, that they were terrified of Mr. Pellicot. But when you look at the video, you can hear whispers. There's no trace of Mr. Pellicot being violent. There is violence, sure, but they were the ones perpetrating it. Real violence, monstrosity even.

But they are in such denial that even after seeing the videos, when asked again, Did you rape Mme Pellicot?

They still say no. It's just unbelievable. Their wives came to testify, too, saying, Of course not, but my husband or my boyfriend would never do that. I think I It would have also been one of those women if the roles had been reversed. There was even a mother, a mom who was my age. I'm 73 now, but that was two years ago. She came to testify talking about her baby boy, even though he was 45. That was another outlandish thing to hear. My baby boy would be incapable of raping this woman. She wouldn't even look at me. It was like he couldn't have raped this woman. This also was very shocking and violent for me because I wasn't recognized. If he raped me, then I must have been okay with it. That's basically what she meant.

At the limite, she You mentioned the role of the videos, and up until right before the trial, you had never watched the videos of the rapes.

It's inconceivable, actually, to have to sit through that and watch that happen to you. But as you know, without those videos, you wouldn't have had the proof to show these men were lying about what had actually taken place, and you probably wouldn't have been believed. How do you think about that?

When I decided I didn't want a close trial, my lawyers told me, careful, you refuse to see them before, but now you'll have to watch them. And I didn't feel ready. I thought this would be very difficult for me.

At some point, one of my lawyers said, Now you do have to watch them.

So we picked a day for me to lock myself in my office, and I watched them via video conference. They asked me if I was ready. Obviously, you can never be ready to watch this video. But I thought to myself, you have to go through with this. You said no to a close trial, so you have to go through with this. My lawyer asked me nicely, whenever you're ready, Giselle. He started the first video. I think he actually started with one of the hardest to watch, and it's unbearable watching this truly. Your own eye is thinking, how is it even possible you're seeing this? You see the The violence of these individuals. They're animals, in fact, and you're this disjointed, unconscious body without a soul with nothing left in it. I didn't watch all of them as it would I've taken a considerable amount of time. I don't know how many of them there were. There were several of them per individual. I watched many of them, how many, I don't know. Each time people asked me if I was all I was just taking it. It's like a boxer rolling with the punches. You fall and you get back up.

That was pretty much it.

At one point, once we were done, I needed to go for a walk, and that's when my tears started streaming.

I was thinking, How could this man I shared my life with, the father of my children, have these people come in? Because he knew what this was. That's when you think, What was going on in his head? How could he not feel compassion at some point?

When I came back from my walk, I told my friend, Listen, let's talk about something else.

My brain had recorded it, but I put it in a corner of my mind, and I thought, All right, they're here. We'll be able to use them as evidence because it's true, not all victims have this evidence. I had it. We showed them during the trial. Since they were denying it, we showed these videos, but I didn't watch them. I looked at my phone. I was with this lady from the Victims Support Association who was helping me, and I looked at pictures of the beach of Monventou. That was my escape as they were watching me. What deeply shocked me, and it's unbelievable to think about this, It's that I could hear myself snore in all those videos because of how sedated I was.

There was nothing left of me. It was shocking to hear myself snore as they were doing what they were doing.

I think most of them believe they don't belong in jail. I'm not sure they're fully aware of what they've done, of the crime they've committed. It's important to note that rape is a crime and that you should be punished for it. I did get that chance. All of them were found guilty. That was a victory for me. But I I position myself in the shoes of other victims who are subjected to the same things because I don't have any memory of it. This, too, helped me put myself back together. But for victims who do have memories of what happened, can you imagine what goes through their head when they're told that their case is closed without further action due to a lack of evidence? Because it's one person's word against another. It's important to underline that. It must be really hard for these victims to put themselves back together.

One of the things that people noticed about you during the trial was how collected you were, how well you dressed, how elegant you were. You wrote in the book, You had no choice but to be invincible. That feels like a heavy burden.

I've always been elegant in my life because I've always been working, and I think this comes from my parents. One of the lawyers from the My defense asked one of my lawyers, How come she's always so elegant when she comes in the morning? The more people said it to me, the more I took time to be elegant. It was also a way for me to prop up this tortured body. Every element that is shattered by rape, it was about saying, I'm standing up, look at this abused, tortured body. The more people said it to me, the more I took care to be elegant. It was a way of saying, You will not affect me. That was the strength I had within me. When I woke up in the morning, I put on some music and asked myself, What will I wear today? Just to annoy them. I could be using another word for it. But I did take care to remain elegant until the end.

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One of the most moving things at the trial were all the women that came to support you Every day, they were clapping, they were chanting, and you were getting all these letters. What were people saying to you? What were those interactions like?

I think this trial echoed their suffering. They recognized themselves, and my trial was also a way of doing them justice.

At first, I decided to be there for only two weeks, but I felt a responsibility to see it through because I saw them every morning when I came in. They would come in early, it was raining, it was cold, and I could see these women waiting for the courthouse to open its doors.

It touched me. It moved me deeply because they were by my side, and they gave me incredible strength. Their presence outside the building softened what was happening for me inside the courtroom, and I thanked them for it. I received thousands of letters from all over the world, which also surprised me. Not all those women were victims, of course, but I think there was a lot of suffering in the letters I received. They thanked me for talking about it because now they were no longer afraid to do it as well. I got so many messages from women telling me, thanks to you, I'm going to file a complaint and it won't be a close court trial. Some even told me, I'm going to divorce, I'm going to leave my husband. That was also surprising. I think entire generations of women have been muzzled, and this trial enabled these women to talk openly.

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In the end, Mr. Pellicot was sentenced to 20 years in prison, the maximum. All the Others received varying sentences. Was justice served?

For me, it was.

The sentence doesn't matter. Mr. Pellicot was sentenced to 20 years. He was the ring leader of this whole masquerade, this sordid affair. As for the others, what mattered to me was that they had been found guilty, which is why I did not contest their sentences. My children Children were shocked by the sentences some of them received, but what mattered for me was that they were all found guilty.

Not all the men in the videos have been IDed. Some of them are still out there. That must be hard for you, though.

I try not to think too much about it. In Avignon, I met a man who paid for my meal, and I had gone to pay my bill. I was lunching with my lawyers before heading back to the courtroom in the afternoon, and they tell me your meal has been paid for. I said, No, that's not possible. They say, Yes, by the man over there. I went to thank him and asked him where he lived, and he lived not far from Mazan. Once we had finished talking, I said to my lawyers, What if he is one of my rapists who wasn't arrested? Of course, I thought about it. I no longer do, or at least less often, because I'm not paranoid, but of course, I think that I could cross paths with one of these men who knows me, even though I don't know them. I sometimes think about it, but then I quickly try to stop thinking about it.

God, that's so hard. I mean, one of the things, as you know, that came out at the trial is real shock over how many men in a small village could be rapists. One was even your neighbor. Mazin is not unique. It's not different in any way. There's nothing special about it. What can we understand from that?

I don't think my story is an isolated case. I've learned about stories that are similar to mine.

Not long ago, I learned about a case, I think it was in Germany, where a man raped his wife for 15 years.

He offered her to other men. Of course, this says a lot about men's behavior, but we should not think all men would do this. That's another important point to note, because if we start saying all men are rapists, that's going to become a real problem. What I really believe that we need to educate our children at a very early age. I don't know what education these men received. Most had extremely hard journeys through life. Some were raped themselves, but having suffered as a child It's not because we have suffered in your infancy that we repeat the same pattern.

Mr. Peligaud is now under investigation for two earlier crimes, including one from 1999, in which he's accused of attempting to a young woman using Ether, a drug. The crime had been a cold case until his arrest, and he eventually confessed to the assault after DNA evidence linked him. How did that change your understanding of who he was and the crimes against you? Because it seems that this behavior was going on for far longer than even the police had realized.

I I learned about this case in November 2022, two years after I discovered the horror I'd been subjected to. The day I got this call from the investigative team in Nanterre, I didn't even understand what they were talking about because I was completely tangled up in my own story. In addition, I had the flu, I was sick, and I asked them to say it again. I said, Yes, I know about Mr. Pelico's case, and the investigator on the phone told me, No, we're not talking about the same case. We're talking about a case that took place in '99 in Paris. Good thing I was sitting because I think I would have collapsed on the floor. To me, it was like a bomb had gone off for a second time. It was like a descent into the abyss. I asked myself, But how? How did I not notice any signs? Meaning he must have come home that evening because he always came home in the evening. We must have sat down at the dinner table with the children. I most likely cooked him a meal. That evening, he behaved as if nothing had happened. Even the children didn't notice anything.

We didn't notice that he wasn't in a good mood. I didn't notice stains on his suit. I didn't notice any scratches because I think this young woman most likely fought back. Once again, he managed to put up a wall. He showed us one of his two faces, a considerate, caring man, but we didn't see the other face. He was actually Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

He's also currently being investigated for the rape and murder of another woman in the early 1990s, something which he denies and is continuing to be investigated. I'm sure you must have been thinking about this for so long. Who was Mr. Pelico? How could he have done these horrific things and then, as you say, come back and eat dinner with his family?

Regarding that young woman's murder, I still hope today that he's not the author of this crime.

I really hope he's not. For now, he's presumed innocent, but I really hope that this family He will get the truth because the family of this departed young girl also needs mending because this was over 30 years ago, and I don't know how her mom can keep enduring this today. But if he's guilty, he will have no choice but to accept it, of course, and it will be another hellish journey for his children and for me.

I want to just touch again on the on your family, which we talked about earlier. You have had a difficult relationship with Caroline. Can you tell me how that relationship has evolved? It must have been very painful for you to be estranged. There was a moment that she wasn't speaking to you because she felt that you didn't support her fully. Now that relationship seems to have been repaired. Can you just talk to me a little bit about some of the challenges that you faced with your daughter?

As my case started to evolve, it's true the investigating judge didn't push the investigation concerning Caroline because I think there were so many defendants in my case, and there was all this evidence showing these rapes.

For Caroline, there were two pictures that raised questions. There was indeed the father's ancestor's gaze on his daughter. I never denied it, but I didn't want her to suffer. Because while I was trying to have this shell, my daughter, we have different characters. I think she's more fragile than I am, and I didn't want her to plunge into this pain and suffering. It's true, I might have inadequately supported her at first. She was angry at me because of it, which is entirely reasonable. But I didn't abandon her. I tried to alleviate her suffering, and I don't think she saw it that way. That's why she put some distance between us. I think she felt I wasn't trying to understand what she was going through. It's not that I wasn't trying to understand. I was trying to lift her towards the light because I didn't want her to fall apart. I never gave myself permission to fall apart in front of my children, but she had a right to fall apart, especially as he's her father, and she was extremely close to her father. As time went by, I also put some distance between us. Maybe this was a way to protect myself because her hatred and anger was something I had trouble carrying.

By putting some distance, I thought that way she'll be able to heal, to find peace. Yet as of now, she still hasn't. But I underwent surgery towards the end of November, and at Christmas, she called to ask how I was doing. I got a sense that she had a need for me to be closer to her. That's what's happening now. I'm being very careful because there's still a lot of hatred and anger towards her father, but she realized I wasn't the one responsible for it, and I think she might have conflated her father and me. Now I think she's thinking, My mother is not responsible for any of this.

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Have you seen each other?

No, not yet, but she sent me videos of Maxime playing rugby.

I got a call from her just this morning. I think we'll be seeing each other.

At the end of the book, you say you want to go and speak to Mr. Pelico in prison. I mean, have you done that yet? What do you need to know?

No, I haven't yet, but I've always wished to see him.

It will be hard for me to go this year, but maybe by the end of the year, I want to do it because I hope that when we're face to face, he'll be able to tell me the truth, both about his daughter and about everything else he's now accused of. Maybe he'll have some remorse when we're face to face. I'm still holding on to that hope. Maybe I'm naive, maybe I won't get an answer, but I hope I'll be able to get the answers he was unable to provide in front of Avignon's criminal court. Maybe when we're face-to-face, he'll have some remorse, or maybe he'll say, I need to free my conscience. That's why I want to go.

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It's going to be very hard it happens.

Yes, I do think it will be a difficult moment for me. I've never set foot inside a prison. I imagine he must be in solitary confinement. I imagine he's changed a lot, but he's there because he did what he did. It's not like he was sent there by accident. But I do hope he'll have some remorse if he's actually capable of it, and that I.

There were four years between Mr. Pellicol's arrest and the trial that got so much coverage, and you end up in this period moving to a small French Island. You make new friends, and you find love again. I think many people would find that incredible that you could trust a man again.

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I'd never imagine falling in love again or even that it could be something I'd want. To me, it was impossible. We had mutual friends, and one of those friends threw a party, well, several parties, actually. I met this man who had also had a difficult journey because for 10 years, he took care of his wife who had a severe illness, and he stayed with her until her dying breath. We talked a lot. We were two battered souls, and I didn't dare talk to him about... Because he didn't know much about me. He hadn't read a lot about my case in the press. Of course, I was reluctant to tell him about what I went through. It could also scare him off to think, who really is this woman? Actually, it happened naturally. He had read a piece in Le Monde, and he's the one who started talking to me about my story. He made me comfortable. Then we started dating, and then we fell in love. We thought, maybe this won't last. Then we went to the opera to see Carmen. We were two teenagers. I had my first kiss on the day we saw Carmen.

Then I thought, yes, maybe there's something there. That's it. He changed my life. He truly did. I trust him fully because I think he's a very beautiful soul. You might tell me you also trusted Mr. Pelico, but I don't think he has that perversion. He didn't have the same childhood Mr. Pelico had. He had a happy childhood, and I know his children, his family, and friends. His friends have known him for 30 years, and I think we're going to do great things together. I think we'll make the most of those beautiful years we have left. I hope that last.

We should say he's here with you today.

He's hidden. I won't show him.

But he's a very private person, too. We're very much alike.

Madame, can I call you Giselle?

Oui, bien sûr..

Giselle was chanted all over the world. Thank you, Giselle. So of course, Giselle. Of course.

Giselle, I am curious. We've talked about your mind and how you have, as you say, been able to stay standing all this time. But after everything that you've physically gone through, how do you feel about your own body?

I think I was able to heal myself. I go on walks, on bike rides. I'm fortunate to be living on a beautiful island. I feel good in my mind and in my body. I'm all right with my age, 73. It's not easy. You get more and more wrinkles, but I'm all right with them because I'm fortunate to have these wrinkles, which my mother never got to have. That's important.

.

As you see, I still get emotional when I talk about her. I'm lucky to be alive.

Giselle Pélicorne, merci beaucoup.

C'est moi qui vous remercie.

That's Giselle Pelicot. Her book, A Him to Life: Shame Has to Change Sides, will be published on February 17th. To watch portions of this interview and many other interviews, you can subscribe to our YouTube channel at youtube. Com/@symboltheinterviewpodcast. This conversation was produced by White Orm. It was edited by Annabelle Bacon, mixing by Carol Saboreau. Interpretation by Grace Kostin. Voiceover work by Stephanie Shostack. Original music by Dan Powell, nick Pitman, and Marion Lozano. Photography by Philip Gay. The rest of the team is Priya Matthew, Seth Kelly, Afim Shapiro, Paula Neudorff, Zack Caldwell, Joe Bill Buneos, Eddie Costas, David Herr, Pat Gunther, Kathleen O'Brien, and Brooklyn Minters. Our executive producer is Allison Benedict. Next week, David talks to Jay Shetty about his path from monk to wellness influencer and whether the two are in conflict.

I think both spirituality and success are not mutually exclusive.

Even if they are, and that's what I discover at the end of my life, I'm open to that. But that experiment fascinates me and pulls me closer to it.

So that's how I'd like to be seen.

I'm Lulu García-Navarro, and this is The Interview from The New York Times.