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The French woman, who endured nearly a ten years of rapes by dozens of men after being drugged by her former spouse, is set to appear court in France once more this Monday. This follows one of the men convicted of raping her filed an appeal, triggering a new hearing.

Pelicot emerged as a symbol of women's rights after opting to forgo her anonymity during the 2024 trial involving her ex-husband and numerous defendants. Her attorney, Antoine Camus, explained that while she would have preferred the stress of another trial, she will be in attendance throughout the four-day appeal at the Nîmes court in southern France.

“Her presence is essential to make clear that a rape is a rape, that there is no concept as a small rape,” Camus informed reporters.

Husamettin Dogan, a 44-year-old construction worker given to nine years in prison for raping Pelicot, has challenged his conviction. The first trial revealed that Dogan reached out to her then-husband through a online forum and traveled to their home the same night in June 2019, informing his own wife he was going out. He was found guilty of raping Gisèle Pelicot while she was unconscious.

Dogan claimed during the first trial that he believed it was a form of role-play. “I am not a criminal, that’s too difficult for me to accept,” he said. His legal representative declined to comment before the appeal.

Initially, 17 of the 51 convicted men indicated they would appeal, but 16 dropped out over time, leaving only one appeal proceeding.

Dominique Pelicot, considered one of the worst sex offenders in recent French memory, was handed 20 years in prison for drugging his then-wife and arranging for multiple men to rape her at their home in southern France over nearly a decade of marriage.

Testimony in last year’s trial disclosed that Dominique Pelicot had crushed sleeping pills and anti-anxiety medication into his wife’s food or drinks, then brought in men to assault her in the village of Mazan in south-east France. A total of 50 other men were found guilty in the case.

Now in a prison sentence in solitary confinement, Dominique Pelicot is scheduled to appear as a witness at the appeal. He is likely to repeat his earlier testimony: “I admit to being a perpetrator and all the charged men in this room are rapists.”

Gisèle Pelicot, a 72-year-old former logistics manager, had insisted that the initial trial be held in open court to educate the public about assault under sedation. “We should not feel ashamed, it’s for them,” she stated in court.

The case generated a massive impact globally, with feminist organizations across all continents backing Gisèle Pelicot and world leaders issuing statements in her support.

However, campaigners and attorneys noted that the case highlighted how prevalent and commonplace rape and sexual violence remains.

In a separate case, a 46-year-old man in Normandy was given 12 years in prison for raping his partner while she was asleep on multiple instances in 2022. Similar to Dominique Pelicot, he first came to police attention for filming up a woman’s skirt in a supermarket, and investigators later discovered videos of the assaults on his electronic devices.

The appeal in the Pelicot case takes place amid increasing criticism of the French justice system’s handling of rape. Several damning reports since the first trial have shown that the system continues to disappoint rape victims on a large scale.

This year, the European Court of Human Rights condemned France for “not safeguarding” the rights of three teenagers who reported rape.

One teenager who accused more than a dozen firefighters of abuse was found to have suffered “secondary victimisation and discriminatory treatment” by the French justice system, which failed to protect her dignity “by permitting the use of moralising and guilt-inducing statements, which reinforced gender stereotypes.”

In another instance, France was found to have breached the European Convention on Human Rights in the case of a hospital pharmacist who filed a rape complaint against her supervisor.

This month, the High Council for Equality, an advisory body attached to the French prime minister’s office, reported that despite a tripling in rape complaints in France since the global #MeToo movement in 2016, the number of cases proceeding to trial remains dangerously low, with only 3.3% of complaints resulting in convictions.

More than 130 feminist groups are campaigning for comprehensive changes at every level of the French justice system in dealing with rape, calling for major funding increases and improved state support and prevention.

“The Pelicot case was a form of electric shock, it allowed a lot of people to talk about rape and marital rape. However, there has not really been a political response. There is a great deal lacking in France, and serious dysfunction [in the justice system],” said Anne-Cécile Mailfert of the Fondation des Femmes.

Separately, parliament is currently debating adding a clear legal standard of rape into French law.

Marie-Charlotte Garin, a Green MP who supports rewording the law, stated that the Pelicot case had transformed French society’s understanding of consent and that changing the legal wording would help “a cultural change to move from a tolerance of assault to a culture of consent.”

However, Garin emphasized that wording alone is insufficient to address persistent “shortcomings” of the entire French state toward rape survivors. “We need a revolution in the system to improve how we handle rape,” she said.