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89 - Gisèle Pelicot (Replay Episode)
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Transcript
Introduction and Gratitude
00:00:00
Speaker
Hello, Sam. Hi, Jeff. Welcome to the Jeff and Sam show. I'm Jeff.
00:00:25
Speaker
to the jeff and sam show i'm jeff I'm Sam. And this is your show because you're listening to it. We're happy to be here
Platform Presence and Support Request
00:00:32
Speaker
for you. You can find us on Instagram, Gmail, Apple, Spotify, Amazon, iHeartRadio. Rate us, review us, give us some likes. Look at how fast you're doing that. It's like I've done it before. Once or twice.
Significant Story Replay
00:00:43
Speaker
um Also, this is not your normal show. We're going replay for you a show that a story that I did a while back.
Giselle Pelico's Story Emerges
00:00:52
Speaker
But why?
00:00:53
Speaker
Because this lady, Giselle Pelico, is in the news again because she has a book. And it's called Shame Has to Change Sides. Fuck yes. so this lady, her husband husband got caught in a supermarket.
00:01:07
Speaker
It was called upskirting. He put the like his phone on record and would record under women's skirts. Really classy move. That's how he got caught. And then when they took him to the police station, they found out that he had He solicited, allowed 50, 60, 70 people, I don't remember how many exactly, to come over to his house while he drugged his wife. He would say, I just drugged her. We have to give it about an hour.
00:01:35
Speaker
And he allowed all of these men to rape her, sexually assault her. On film. On film. And this lady, Giselle Pelico, has become like a hero to the women of France, rightfully so, and to the women across the world probably, and to me. I think she's a badass.
00:01:55
Speaker
because of how graciously she went about moving forward with it, you know, and and, and she was composed and classy and just a fucking all-star about how she responded to this absolutely heinous crime that her husband repeatedly committed.
Shame and Public Awareness
00:02:21
Speaker
And not only that, like how she wanted it all in public because shame has to change sides. Shame has Such a good title for a book. God dang it's such a good title for Did you buy already? No, not yet, but I'm going to because I would love to read her point of view.
00:02:37
Speaker
I mean. And in some of the interviews ive I've seen, the interviewer asked her if she ever wants to talk to her ex-husband again. And she does say yes simply because she wants answers. Is she expecting answers? Probably not because she's a smart woman. He's just a fucking horrible human.
00:02:56
Speaker
But um that said, like her story is horrifying, but to see her handle this with such grace in public, is she's remarkable.
00:03:08
Speaker
Remarkable. That is a good word for it. that's That is, I think that's, I mean, no words do her justice, but if you're going to come close, remarkable is it Strong. She's strong, remarkable, and I love a strong woman.
00:03:23
Speaker
Do you? I've done many, many shows about a strong woman. I've never heard one. Every time I can't think of a story to do, I'm like, who's a strong woman? Let me find a strong woman. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, that's we're going to replay
Unfolding Crimes of Dominique
00:03:34
Speaker
the story that I did that tells the story of Giselle Pellico and what she went through. And so when you see interviews with her, given her side of the story, just so you will know what a badass she is, because she indeed is a badass.
00:03:50
Speaker
um So, yeah, we're going to replay that story for you. This was a quick intro for that. This is just out of the blue kind of idea that I had. And we hope you enjoy it. It's going great. It's going great. going love it.
00:04:04
Speaker
Okay. So the story I'm going to tell you, um it's a story that's evoked a lot of emotion and talk around the world. The woman at the center of this story as a warrior.
00:04:16
Speaker
You know, i love a strong woman. You do. It's as simple as that. I'm in awe of her. She stood and faced the many, many people who sexually assaulted her head on. And she did this in the court of law So today you and I are going to go to France, okay?
00:04:33
Speaker
And I'm going to tell you the harrowing story of a warrior from France named Giselle Pellicot. You said that so scandalously. I love it. Probably not right. That's how going say it. worked for me. Have you heard of her?
00:04:46
Speaker
Yes. You know exactly who i'm talking about, don't you? I do. I was talking to Nick about this, actually. It's crazy. that Well, I'm going to tell you the details, okay? Please do. So Giselle was born in 1952 in Germany. Eventually she would move to France and then meet a man named Dominique.
00:05:03
Speaker
They married in 1973 and they had children. They were described as the ideal couple. Oh, that's always danger. Right. People looked at them as examples. They had wonderful children. they The children described their father as warm, present, and encouraging, even joyful.
00:05:22
Speaker
In 2013, Giselle is working as a manager of a store in Paris, but then the couple decide to retire, and they move to him a town called Mazan. This is in a province called Avignon, France.
00:05:36
Speaker
Giselle and Dominique become members of the community. She's in the choir while he's doing cycling club stuff. he's They're part of the community. Life is good. Right? Right. Yeah, life is good for them until it isn't.
00:05:50
Speaker
So in September 2020, Dominique is arrested. And it turns out he's in a grocery store and he's using his phone to record up women's skirts.
Organized Assault Evidence
00:05:59
Speaker
This is called upskirting, I've learned. Didn't even know that was a thing. You've been sharing a lot of terms recently. I'm not a fan. Sure.
00:06:07
Speaker
um He was literally using his phone to take pics and record up women's skirts. And he got busted. So now he's busted. And when he is booked, he's found with a camcorder and a camera in his bag along with the condom.
00:06:22
Speaker
Kind of random. Side note, I mean, a condom, like, you you've been married for 50 years at this point. Keep that in mind, okay? um When the police questioned him, he was basically like, look, my wife has been gone. i couldn't overcome my urges. You know how guys are.
00:06:42
Speaker
Haven't had sex in a while. Honestly, it sounded like he was blaming every fucking body in the world but himself. So all of this equipment was then seized as standard practice and they start looking into the devices, to his devices.
00:06:55
Speaker
This is giving me monster in the morgue. Yes. oh my God. So they start looking into his devices and here's where the situation goes from a to B. to Z. I mean, it just goes.
00:07:09
Speaker
ah They find out that he's a member of a chat room on a website called Cocoa. Coco has since been shut down in 2024, last year, by the authorities, and the founder was arrested because the website had been cited for more than 23,000 reports of criminal activity and more than 480 victims between 2021 and 2024. Holy crap. according According to the Guardian website.
00:07:39
Speaker
The chat room that Pelico was part of was called... a son ensue, which translates to without their consent. Oh.
00:07:50
Speaker
And in his conversations with other people on the site, they're discussing performing sexual acts on their partners without their consent after even having drugged them. This was a common practice.
00:08:02
Speaker
I think it's important to tell that the website was owned by a Bulgarian company named Vinici S.A., which was operated by a man named Isaac Steidel, or Stadel.
00:08:14
Speaker
It was in this chat room where Dominique invited many, many, many men to rape his wife and then to watch videos of the thing that they had just done to her.
00:08:25
Speaker
So police also find messages from Dominique where he's bragging of drugging his wife and inviting strangers to have sex with her. On all of these devices, police found more than 300 photos and tons of videos of men sexually assaulting an incapacitated Giselle.
Police Confrontation with Giselle
00:08:45
Speaker
In total, the police find more than 20,000 photos and videos on that USB that was attached to Dominique's computer. Now, in that USB, there was also a folder where he nicely organized all of this stuff. at least he was organized.
00:09:01
Speaker
Monster. The folder is called abuse. Okay. I mean, you can't get more premeditated than that. Yeah, no. I'm i'm just organized. Completely organized. If you're going to organize a folder with the title abuse to put all of this horrible shit into, that just speaks of, yeah, i know exactly you what You've been planning. Yeah, you've been planning So all of these videos and pics that had been meticulously filed by Pellico um He has detailed everything.
00:09:32
Speaker
So basically, he had inadvertently handed over the cops all of the info they needed, including the names of all the perpetrators. Well, not all of them, not all of them, but most of them.
00:09:43
Speaker
So the police start building a timeline and the timeline starts in 2011.
00:09:49
Speaker
So starting in 2011, the police are able to identify about 200 separate rapes committed against Giselle from 2011 to rapes were initially committed by 72 men... the rapes were initially committed committed by seventy-two men At some point, there was as many as 83, so the number is from 72 to 83.
00:10:10
Speaker
okay In addition to that, they found pictures of Pelico's daughter-in-law in the shower without her consent. But something even crazier than that is that they found pictures of Dominique and Giselle's daughter.
00:10:28
Speaker
um As she was laying in the bed, the only thing that she was wearing, she was unconscious in the bed, but the only thing that she had on were her mom's underwear. So I guess he had dressed her in her mom's underwear for the picture.
00:10:40
Speaker
Oh. So police build a case based on the timeline of events over the course of two months. Then they ask Giselle and Dominique to come in and have a talk with them. ah All Giselle knows at this point is that her husband Dominique has been in trouble for upskirting women.
00:10:57
Speaker
This is all that she knows, okay? It's unclear um to police whether she has any idea what has been happening to her or not.
Betrayal Realization
00:11:08
Speaker
They arrive at the police station and the police start questioning Dominique. Giselle is very defensive of him. They start to sort of pry into the Pelico relationship. And they ask Giselle if they've ever practiced partner swapping, to which she replies, no, I'm a one-man woman.
00:11:26
Speaker
But they have all of this material of her with these other men. So they continue probing. And basically she said she would never want another man touching her.
00:11:38
Speaker
So then the police have to be a little bit more direct, right? They show Giselle a photograph of herself, but they don't tell her that that's her in the photo. They ask who the woman is in the photo who appears to be sleeping. In this photo, there is clearly a man raping her.
00:11:54
Speaker
She doesn't recognize the person in the photo, again, which is her. The brain does stuff to protect itself. You know what I mean? So in an attempt to allow Giselle to recognize her own self in the pic, The person showing her says, look at the bedside table.
00:12:10
Speaker
Look at the bed. Could they belong to you? She said that she did not recognize the bed or the table or the woman in the picture. Then they show her a second photo.
00:12:22
Speaker
And that's when all of a sudden, Giselle knows that the person being raped in that picture is her. Now, can you imagine how horrible Giselle, how horrified she is by what she's looking at? She started talking to the police about her life, her relationship.
00:12:40
Speaker
Up to that point, up to that very point in 2020, she thought she was in a perfectly happy relationship. But she had been violated. However, in this case, not only violated, but by her husband, the one person she's supposed to trust, has violated her in such a horrible way.
00:12:57
Speaker
So when Giselle leaves the police station, she goes back home. She packs. She said that she packed everything that was left of her 50 years of life together. And then she filed for divorce.
Legal Actions and Victim Support Changes
00:13:08
Speaker
And suddenly it was all over.
00:13:11
Speaker
But on November 2nd, 2020, Polico is arrested again, and he's charged with aggravated rape, sexual abuse, and drugging. At this time, Dominique, he starts singing like a bird.
00:13:23
Speaker
He says that in 2011, he starts drugging his wife with lorazepam. This is a benzodiazepine. It's used for anxiety, and it also makes you really sleepy. And another side effect of this drug is that it makes you extremely forgetful.
00:13:36
Speaker
So he adds lorazepam to her food, to her drinks. Oftentimes it makes her go into a very, very deep sleep. This allows Dominique to commit the heinous acts on her.
00:13:47
Speaker
Dominique was actually somehow prescribed, I don't get this, but 450 lorazepam tablets. um Yeah, I don't know. I couldn't find anything that gives an explanation of that.
00:14:00
Speaker
but he could have just saved them up yeah he had access to all these tablets right uh when he got a hold of these pills he started inviting other people to participate in the sexual assault of jacelle um as for the rapes dominique would do it the same time every well the same way every single time he had asked the men to park far away from the house He never wanted Giselle to wake up.
00:14:25
Speaker
So he made the guys strip in the kitchen. They couldn't wear any cologne. They couldn't smoke. They had to warm up their hands somehow with like a hand warmer or warm water to not wake Giselle. He was doing everything he could to keep her asleep.
00:14:40
Speaker
Also, he asked that they didn't wear any condoms. True. He asked if they did not wear any condoms, which, okay, that in and of itself is fucking horrible, but he actually knew that one of these men was HIV positive.
00:14:53
Speaker
Fortunately, Giselle did not contract HIV, but over the course of time, she did contract four other STIs. um It was said that Dominique was also having sex with some of the men himself that were also raping Giselle, and some of the men would provide more medications for him to sedate her.
00:15:13
Speaker
So the entire time all of this is happening, she didn't know. She had no idea that this was happening, but her body was keeping track of it, right? So she dropped over 30 pounds. um All of her hair started falling out.
00:15:27
Speaker
She, along with her family and friends, thought that she was getting Alzheimer's. it was early onset Alzheimer's. She even woke with a new haircut one morning, and she didn't remember getting the haircut. But her hairdresser confirmed that she had been in the day before and got the haircut.
00:15:44
Speaker
Giselle went to the doctor and to the gynecologist several times. Every single time, Dominique was with her. just It's so easy to sit here in hindsight see the manipulation.
00:15:58
Speaker
But she tested positive for those STIs and he, and she was always really fatigued, kind of dazed and confused, but he would always be right there by her side saying, well, she was caring for the grandchildren, the the excuse for this. He was excusing everything away. Well, he was so loving and caring. He was there to support Absolutely. So they never dug too deep into what was actually going on with Giselle.
00:16:22
Speaker
Since then, this kind of thing has prompted the doctors and nurses in France to be trained in the area of victims and drug-induced assaults. So there's a new training now.
Trial and Legal Ramifications
00:16:34
Speaker
good on the 19th of june 2023 guanola journeau an investigating judge from avignon judicial court published a 370 page report indicting 51 men for rape the 52nd man died of cancer before he could be arrested the accused who faced prison sentences of up to 20 years of found guilty range between 25 years and 72 years age
00:16:58
Speaker
And came from numerous walks of life, a firefighter, IT worker, journalist, nurse, plumber, prison guard, and truck driver, with 41 of them being from a town very close to their own.
00:17:09
Speaker
Many had partners um and children. Most were charged with one count of rape, attempted rape, or sexual assault, but few were charged with multiple offenses, including one who was charged with six counts of rape.
00:17:24
Speaker
ah One man was charged, not with Giselle, but with drugging and rap raping his own wife. Dominique was also charged with the same offense. While 49 were charged with rape, one of the accused was charged with attempted rape and one sexual assault. A total of 23 of the accused had previous convictions, including six for domestic violence and two for sexual violence.
00:17:46
Speaker
Some of the accused admitted their guilt, while others claimed that the acts were consensual.
Inspiration and Shifting Shame
00:17:51
Speaker
with Giselle pretending to be asleep or agreeing to be drugged or that her husband's consent was sufficient.
00:17:57
Speaker
Fuck you. Right, right, right. Because my husband speaks for me yeah in terms of my body. Five of the men were also charged with possessing images images of child sexual abuse.
00:18:08
Speaker
Twelve of the accused appealed their indictment at the Court of Appeals, but that was rejected on the 5th of October, 2023. As for Giselle, she waived her right to anonymity. She requested that a public trial the trial be public because she's a warrior.
00:18:26
Speaker
She also said that placing herself in the public frame was so that she could save others from these kinds of actions. As for the shame, i love this quote, Giselle said, the shame is for them.
00:18:37
Speaker
i did nothing wrong. I don't deserve this. And it's not for me to take on that shame and internalize it. Boom. Wow. Wow. The trial, heard by a panel of five judges led by presiding judge Roger Arrota, began at the judicial court in Avignon on the of September 2024 till of December 2024. this just finished last month.
00:18:57
Speaker
the twentieth of december twenty twenty four so this just finished last month At the request of Giselle, like I said, the proceedings were all held in public. Let the sunlight in. Yeah. Eighteen of the accused were detained while 32 were attending the trial as free men and one was being judged in absentia. The courtroom was especially adapted to accommodate the large number of defendants and about 60 lawyers with a separate transmission room for the press and the public.
00:19:28
Speaker
Dominique Pellico was sentenced to 20 years in prison at the time, at the end of the trial. This is the maximum amount of time for somebody in France. Giselle watched as the defendants were all found guilty and given sentences ranging from three to 20 years.
00:19:43
Speaker
And I like this. I'm going to, this is a little bit of a repeat. but I'm going to do it because it kind of gives just more insight into who these people were. The men in the dock represented a broad cross-section of society. There was a soldier, a plumber, a retired firefighter. The youngest was in his 20s and the eldest in his 70s.
00:20:02
Speaker
There was a Jerome and a Mohammed, an Adrian and an Ahmed. show um Some showed contrition, others didn't. One named Simone McInnes...
00:20:14
Speaker
was sentenced to nine years, the father of six who lived next door to the Pelicos and like most defendants blamed Dominique for manipulating him. Oh.
00:20:25
Speaker
Giselle has become a feminist hero, and according to one French broadcaster, her refusal to be shamed won her international acclaim. So it should. Her courage has been remarkable and inspirational.
00:20:37
Speaker
ah She said, i wanted all women who are rape victims to say to themselves, Miss Pellicott did it, and so can I do it too, she told the court in October.
00:20:48
Speaker
It's not us who should feel shame, but them. And also with respect, I think it's important to say that when women or men are sexually assaulted and they go to court, it's oftentimes a really hard and painful experience. That's why it doesn't happen as often as it should.
00:21:06
Speaker
And they aren't celebrated like Giselle. She was very much celebrated and they don't have all the support from all the people like she did. And oftentimes not only are they not celebrated, but...
00:21:17
Speaker
ah for their courage, like they should be, but they're often torn down on the stand. Yeah. So it's a whole different... Blamed and... Yeah. That needs to be said, you know? In a statement after the trial, Giselle said, quote, I think of the unrecognized victims whose stories often remain in the shadows, and I want you to know that we share the same fight.
00:21:37
Speaker
I wanted, by opening the doors of this trial on September 2nd, that society could take hold of the debates that took place there. I've never regretted the decision. decision i now have confidence in our ability to collectively seize a future in which women and men can live in harmony with respect and mutual understanding.
00:21:56
Speaker
I thank you. End
Show Conclusion and Future Stories
00:21:57
Speaker
quote. And that is the story of Giselle Pellico. That's amazing. i mean, horrible. It's horrible, but she is like, there's images of her sitting there looking at all of those men Just with rightfully no shame. It's them. They're the ones that should have all the shame. She did. I think that's such an amazing quote. um Yeah.
00:22:21
Speaker
I think that that's such an amazing quote because it's like ingrained in people. to to feel shame about being sexually assaulted or raped. And ah people don't think about it the way that she worded that, you know, she's right.
00:22:39
Speaker
You did nothing wrong. You didn't ask for this to happen. i don't care how short your skirt was. i don't care how drunk you were. i don't care if at one point you did say yes, and then you changed your mind. Like,
00:22:51
Speaker
whatever it is, it shouldn't have happened. and you should feel no yeah And you should feel no responsibility for it. Because it is. it's the people It's the people that commit the act that are animals. Absolutely.
00:23:07
Speaker
And she said that so well. she was a She came out and gave that beautiful statement at the end of the trial. That's amazing. Yeah. She's a cool woman. I think she was even...
00:23:20
Speaker
Like woman of the year somewhere. Hell yeah. Hell yeah. Okay. So that's the end of a show. That is. We did one more for you. These were good stories today. They were a little little bit on the dark side. little bit.
00:23:35
Speaker
So I'm going to have another kind next week. Okay. Another kind of story. We'll see you next time. That's it, folks. Have a good one. Bye.