Dominique Pelicot sentenced to 20 years in prison in historic French rape trial

Pelicot, along with 50 other men, will face prison for repeatedly raping his wife, Gisèle, over the course of a decade.

Transcript

00:00Dominique Pellicot has been sentenced to 20 years in prison in a historic rape trial that

00:08has turned the victim, his wife Giselle Pellicot, into a feminist hero.

00:13Pellicot drugged and raped his wife for nearly a decade, also offering her unconscious body

00:19to strangers he had met online.

00:22In total, 50 men were tried in what became known as the Mazan rape trial.

00:28The trial triggered protest rallies around France in support of Giselle Pellicot, who

00:32said she hoped that by making the trial public she would help other women speak up.

00:38They kept up their efforts on Wednesday night, plastering messages across Avignon where the

00:43trial took place ahead of the verdict.

00:45I think it has changed society already along these four months.

00:52The day the trial started, we started to talk and talk a lot and think a lot.

00:58And we went through so many emotions.

01:01Activists say the three-month trial has sparked important debates around consent.

01:06Now they are calling for the country's legal definition of rape to be expanded to include

01:11specific mention of it.