The 50 men are accused of the mass rape of Gisèle Pelicot

They are young, old, stocky, thin, black and white. Among them are firefighters, truck drivers, soldiers, security guards, a journalist and a DJ.

These are the 50 men accused of raping Gisèle Pelicot at the behest of her husband, Dominique Pelicot, 72, who drugged her with prescription sleeping pills for a decade.

The fact that they represent, broadly speaking, a microcosm of French society means that they have been dubbed Monsieur Tout Le Monde (Mr. Everyone).

They are due to be sentenced next week, at the end of a trial that began in September. If found guilty, they could face a total of more than 600 years in prison.

Some of them behave defiantly, but mostly they look down as they answer questions from the judges, occasionally looking up to catch the eye of their lawyers in an attempt to calm themselves down.

Warning: Some details of this story may be disturbing to you

Most of the 50 all come from towns and villages within a 50 km (30 mile) radius of Mazan, the Pelicots’ home village.

Some defense attorneys have seen their ordinariness as a valuable line of defense. “Ordinary people do extraordinary things,” said Antoine Minier, a lawyer representing three defendants.

“I think almost anyone could find themselves in a situation – perhaps not quite like this – but where they are at risk of committing a serious crime,” he told the BBC.

Prosecutors have based their sentencing demands on the court on aggravating factors. How often did the defendants come to Pelicot’s house, whether they sexually touched Gisèle Pelicot and whether they penetrated her.

Joseph C, 69, a retired sports coach and loving grandfather, faces four years in prison for sexual assault if found guilty. This is the lightest sentence demanded by the public prosecutor.

At the other end of the scale is Romain V, 63, who faces 18 years in prison. He was knowingly HIV-positive and is accused of raping Gisèle Pelicot six times without wearing protection – even though his lawyer told the court that he had been undergoing treatment for several years and had not transmitted the virus.

Prosecutors were able to go into such detail because, unusually for a rape trial, there is a staggering amount of evidence Alleged assaults were filmed by Dominique Pelicot over almost a decade.

He admitted all the charges against him and told the court that all 50 of his co-defendants were also guilty.

All video evidence indicates that neither man could deny ever visiting the Pelicot home. But the majority vehemently deny the charge of aggravated rape, which would carry heavy penalties.

French rape law defines rape as any sexual act committed by “force, coercion, threat or surprise”; No reference is made to any requirement for consent.

Therefore, they also argue that they cannot be guilty of rape because they did not know that Gisèle Pelicot was incapable of giving her consent.

“There can be no crime without the intention to commit it,” said a defense attorney.

“My body raped her, but not my brain,” volunteer firefighter Christian L. insisted, illustrating the convoluted reasoning of some men.

The only man of 50 who is not accused of raping Gisèle Pelicot is Jean-Pierre M, 63, described as a “disciple” of Dominique Pelicot.

After learning to drug his wife to abuse her, he did it for five years and admits it.

He blames his crimes on the encounter with Dominique Pelicot, who he says was “soothing, like a cousin.” Prosecutors are asking for a 17-year prison sentence.

Ahmed T, a 54-year-old plumber who has been married to his childhood sweetheart for 30 years, said if he wanted to rape someone, he would not have chosen a woman in her 60s.

Redouane A, an unemployed man aged 40, argued that if he wanted to rape Gisèle, he would not have allowed her husband to record videos.

Some also say they were intimidated by Dominique Pelicot, who a lawyer told the BBC was a “vile character”.

In tears, nurse Redouan E told the court he was too afraid of him to leave the bedroom. “You may not be able to tell from the videos, but I was really scared!” he told the judges.

Others claim they were offered drinks laced with drugs and therefore have no recollection of the encounter, although Dominique Pelicot has denied ever doing so.

However, the majority claim they were manipulated or tricked by Dominique Pelicot, who convinced them that they were taking part in a sex game with a consensual couple.

“They were put in a situation where they were cheated,” Christophe Bruschi, Joseph C.’s lawyer, told the BBC. “They were taken.”

But Dominique Pelicot always said he made it clear to the men that his wife knew nothing about the conspiracy.

He gave them instructions not to wake her up or leave any traces that suggested they had been there – such as warming their hands before touching his wife or not smelling of perfume or cigarettes, he said.

“They all knew it, they can’t deny it.”

Since September, the 50 men appeared one after the other before the court in Avignon.

In rape cases, character investigations can typically take several days.

Due to the sheer number of defendants involved, this trial was able to be shortened to a few hours at most. Their lives were dissected at record speed, often turning the court hearing into a litany of stories of abuse and trauma.

Simoné M, a 43-year-old construction worker, said he was raped at age 11 by a family friend who hired him as a livestock herder in the French overseas territory of New Caledonia.

Father-of-four Jean-Luc L, 46, told the court how he and his family left Vietnam on a rubber dinghy as a child and lived in a refugee camp in Thailand for several years before moving to France.

Fabien S, a 39-year-old man with several previous convictions, including drug trafficking and sexual assaults on minors, was abused and beaten by foster parents at a young age. Like several others, he said he only realized during court-ordered psychiatry appointments that his hazy, painful childhood memories actually depicted rape.

Many of the defendants’ wives, partners and family members were invited to character statements. They, too, searched for answers as they tried to understand how the men in their lives “could end up in this situation,” as one woman put it.

“I was shocked, it doesn’t sound like him at all. He was the joy of my life,” said Christian L.’s elderly father.

The firefighter, as well as four other people, are being investigated for possession of child abuse images and face 16 years in prison. “Something must have happened, he must have become depressed,” his father wondered aloud.

Corinne, the ex-wife of 54-year-old Thierry Pa, a former builder, said he had always been “kind” and “respectful” to her and their children and seemed to leave the door open for a reconciliation.

“When they told me what he was accused of, I said, ‘No way, that’s impossible… I don’t understand what he’s doing here at all.'” She believed it was the death of her 18-year-old son that had led to it. that her ex-husband fell into a deep depression, started drinking and eventually contacted Dominique Pelicot.

“I will always be there for him, whatever happens,” said the ex-girlfriend of Guyanese-born Joan K. At 27, he is the youngest of the defendants and a former soldier in the French army.

He has twice denied raping Gisèle Pelicot. Although he knew she would be unconscious, he said he didn’t realize she hadn’t given consent.

Through tears, a woman named Samira said she had spent the last three and a half years “looking for answers” about why Jérôme V went to the Pelicots six times.

“We had sexual intercourse every day, I don’t understand why he had to look elsewhere,” she sobbed. She is still in a relationship with Jérôme V, who was working in a greengrocer’s shop at the time of his arrest.

He is one of the few who has admitted raping Gisèle, saying he liked the idea of ​​having “free reign” over her – but blamed it on his “uncontrollable sexuality”.

Many of the defendants’ former and current partners were tested to determine whether they, like Gisèle, had been drugged. One woman said she “always had terrible doubts” that the “respectful, considerate, nice man” she knew had abused her even without her knowledge.

Since the beginning of the process, much emphasis has been placed on finding an element that connects all of these men.

A common denominator – apart from the fact that all the men joined the Pelicots of their own free will – “remains nowhere to be found,” Gisèle’s own lawyers said.

But all of the defendants undeniably have one thing in common: they all consciously decided not to go to the police.

Firefighter Jacques C, 73, said he thought about it but “then life just went on”, while electrician Patrice N, 55, said he “didn’t want to waste the whole day at the police station”.

At the beginning of the trial, Gisèle Pelicot was asked whether she thought it was legitimate to assume that the men had been manipulated by her husband.

She shook her head: “You didn’t rape me with a gun to my head. They raped me with full conscience.”

Almost as an afterthought, she asked, “Why didn’t they go to the police?” Even an anonymous call could have saved my life.”

“But no one did,” she said after a pause. “Not a single one of them.”