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Gisèle Pelicot, who endured nearly a ten years of rapes by scores of men after being incapacitated by her former spouse, is expected to attend 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 choosing to waive her anonymity during the legal proceedings involving her ex-husband and numerous defendants. Her lawyer, Antoine Camus, explained that while she would have preferred the ordeal of another trial, she will be present throughout the multi-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 told the press.

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

Dogan asserted during the first trial that he believed it was a form of role-play. “I’m not a rapist, that’s too heavy for me to bear,” he said. His legal representative declined to comment before the appeal.

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

Dominique Pelicot, considered one of the most notorious sex offenders in modern French history, was sentenced 20 years in prison for drugging his then-wife and inviting numerous men to rape her at their home in southern France over many years of marriage.

Testimony in last year’s trial disclosed that Dominique Pelicot had mixed sleeping pills and anti-anxiety medication into his wife’s mashed potato or drinks, then invited 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 serving a prison sentence in solitary confinement, Dominique Pelicot is set to appear as a witness at the appeal. He is expected to restate 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 supply chain professional, had insisted that the initial trial be held in open court to raise awareness about assault under sedation. “We should not feel ashamed, it’s for them,” she stated in court.

The case generated a massive effect globally, with feminist organizations across the world supporting Gisèle Pelicot and world leaders issuing statements in her support.

However, campaigners and attorneys noted that the case exposed how widespread and frequent rape and sexual violence remains.

In a separate case, a 46-year-old man in Normandy was sentenced 12 years in prison for raping his partner while she was unconscious on several occasions 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 occurs 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 fail rape complainants on a significant level.

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

One teenager who accused several firefighters of abuse was found to have suffered “secondary victimisation and discriminatory treatment” by the French justice system, which did not act to protect her dignity “by allowing the use of judgmental and guilt-inducing statements, which propagated 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 associated with the French prime minister’s office, found 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 leading to convictions.

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

“This legal battle was a kind of electric shock, it enabled 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 missing in France, and serious dysfunction [in the justice system],” said Anne-Cécile Mailfert of the Fondation des Femmes.

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

Marie-Charlotte Garin, a Green MP who backs rewording the law, stated that the Pelicot case had altered French society’s understanding of consent and that changing the legal wording would help “a societal shift to move from a culture of rape to a respect for autonomy.”

However, Garin stressed that wording alone is insufficient to address persistent “shortcomings” of the entire French state toward rape survivors. “It requires a revolution in the system to improve how we deal with rape,” she said.