Gisele Pelicot's devastating next chapter from new name to family 'torn apart'
Gisele Pelicot's devastating next chapter from new name to family 'torn apart'
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With her monstrous husband now behind bars, Gisèle Pelicot is starting the next chapter of a life that has changed beyond comprehension. And she now faces new challenges within her traumatised family unit. The French grandmother had believed herself to have been happily married to her husband of 50 years, Dominique Pelicot, who she'd first met as a teenager. To the outside world, the pair, both 72, appeared to enjoy an idyllic retirement in the picturesque Medieval town of Mazan, in Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, France, where they would regularly host family BBQs on their sun-drenched terrace.
Then, in September 2020, Gisèle's world came crashing down when Pelicot's unimaginable perversions finally came to light. After he was spotted taking pictures up women's skirts in a shopping centre, officers searched the sick predator's laptop and recovered some 20,000 disturbing videos and pictures of Gisèle being abused, both by himself and by strangers he'd invited into their bedroom.
Mother-of-three Gisèle had been drugged at the time of the attacks and had no clue that she'd been raped around 200 times between the years 2011 to 2020, with Pelicot recruiting her abusers through an illegal and now-closed chat site. During the subsequent trial, which saw twisted Pelicot and 50 other men handed a collective total of 400 years worth of jail time, Gisèle rose as a feminist hero on a global scale, with her rallying cry of "La honte doit changer de camp" or "shame must change sides" inspiring countless women.
