Caroline Darian, the daughter of Dominique and Gisèle Pelicot, is pressing charges against her father, accusing him of drugging and raping her – something he has always denied.
Last December, Dominique Pelicot was sentenced to 20 years in jail for drugging his ex-wife, Gisèle, raping her and inviting dozens of men to also abuse her over nearly a decade.
Pelicot filmed the rapes of his wife, collecting hundreds of videos he neatly catalogued on a hard disk.
Among them were also two photos of his daughter, in which Ms Darian, 46, says she is clearly unconscious, sleeping in an unfamiliar position and wearing underwear she doesn’t recognise.
Dominique Pelicot has offered conflicting explanations for the photos, but has always denied sexually assaulting his daughter.
Ms Darian has long said the photos are proof her father also drugged and raped her.
“I know that he drugged me, probably for sexual abuse. But I don’t have any evidence,” she told the BBC in January, when she also talked about the shock of being shown those pictures by police for the first time.
Police will now launch an investigation, and prosecutors will later decide whether to proceed to trial.
Béatrice Zavarro, Dominique Pelicot’s lawyer, told French media that Ms Darian’s decision to press charges was “unsurprising”.
But she also pointed out that the prosecutors in the previous trial had said there were insufficient “objective elements” to accuse Pelicot of raping and using chemical submission on his daughter.
The heated courtroom exchanges between Ms Darian and her father were some of the most dramatic in the 16-week trial that shocked France and the world. “I never touched you, never,” Pelicot pleaded to his daughter during one session. “You are lying!” Ms Darian shouted back.
Ms Darian has previously said she felt she was the trial’s “forgotten victim” as, unlike in her mother’s case, there was no record of the abuse she is convinced was inflicted upon her.
She told Elle France earlier this week that the charges she is pressing against her father were “symbolic” but “in line with what I have said since the start: that I am a victim of chemical submission [drug-facilitated assault] but was never recognised as such”.
She has hired lawyer Florence Rault to represent her.
For many years, Ms Rault has been fighting for justice for two women who were the victims of violent ordeals in the 1990s.
One, a young property agent known by the pseudonym Marion, was the victim of an attempted rape in 1999, to which Pelicot has admitted.
The other – also an estate agent in her 20s – was raped and murdered in 1991. Pelicot is currently being investigated over that case, but has always denied any involvement.
Ms Darian said she saw similarities between her and Marion. “We look strangely alike. She is blonde, her hair is bobbed, we were born the same year… I wanted to meet her lawyer and hear all the details,” she told Elle France.
In her police complaint, which was quoted by French media, Ms Rault lamented that Ms Darian had never been offered gynecological examinations nor had she been tested for the drugs Pelicot used on his wife.
Ms Rault said the investigation had only focused on Gisèle Pelicot and that her client had been treated as a “peripheral victim”. She asked the authorities to launch a fresh “serious and in-depth” inquiry.
Forty-nine men were sentenced in December alongside Dominque Pelicot. All were found guilty of at least one charge – rape or sexual assault – against Gisèle Pelicot.
Seventeen initially said they would appeal the charges against them, but seven of those have since changed their minds.
Those who decide to press ahead with their appeals will go on trial at the end of the year in Nîmes, southern France.
The first trial – which lasted from September to December 2024 – garnered worldwide attention thanks to Gisèle Pelicot’s decision to waive her anonymity and open the trial to the public and the media.
