Court limits screenings of videos in France mass rape case

AVIGNON, France: Images of men allegedly raping a drugged Frenchwoman won´t be shown when the public or journalists are in court for the trial of dozens of defendants in a case that has horrified France, a judge ruled Friday.

Gisele Pelicot, whose ex-husband and 49 other men are charged over the decade-long alleged mass rape, urged that the footage be shown without restrictions.

The presiding judge in the trial of Dominique Pelicot and dozens of others ruled the videos could be shown at the request of the prosecution or defence, but not as a matter of course.

“We must not shy away from coming face to face with rape,” said Stephane Babonneau, one of Gisele Pelicot´s lawyers. She demanded that the trial be public and had herself decided “from the outset that she would watch these videos”, he said.

But presiding judge Roger Arata said the images were “obscene and shocking” and would therefore not be shown systematically and not with media or the public present.

The ruling comes a day after a number of photos and videos were screened at the trial, without members of the public but in the presence of journalists, showing Dominique Pelicot and a co-accused, identified only as Jacques C., performing sexual acts on Gisele Pelicot who was visibly unconscious.

Prosecutor Jean-Francois Mayer subsequently asked the court to show the thousands of pictures and videos filmed and meticulously archived by Dominique Pelicot.

“Without this evidence there would have been no trial,” he said. “Mrs Pelicot remembers nothing. But even if she had remembered anything, it would have been discussed and contested.”