French sex offender Pelicot says man who abused his ex-wife knew she was asleep

Dominique Pelicot, one of France's worst sex offenders, said on Tuesday the only man appealing his conviction for sexually abusing Pelicot's ex-wife, knew she would be asleep and even asked for help assaulting her.

Husamettin Dogan is seeking to overturn his conviction for raping Gisele Pelicot, whose ex-husband had for over a decade recruited strangers to abuse her while she was drugged. 

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"I never forced anyone, they never needed me," Dominique Pelicot, 72, said in court after being extracted from prison to testify on the second day of the trial in the southern city of Nimes.

He said that Dogan knew from the start that Dominique Pelicot was looking for someone "to abuse (his) wife while she was asleep."

Dogan protests his innocence, saying he was not a "rapist" and insisting he thought he was participating in a libertine couple's sexual game. 

"I never said that," Dominique Pelicot said.

Dogan visited the couple's home on June 28, 2019. He said he only realised that something was wrong when he heard the woman snoring. 

"I have no interest in speaking ill of anyone, except to tell the truth," he added.

In December, Dogan was one of 50 men found guilty of sexual abuse at Dominique Pelicot's invitation and sentenced to nine years in prison. 

During the first trial, which lasted for nearly four months last year, Gisele Pelicot, 72, waived her anonymity, becoming an international icon and a symbol in the fight against sexual violence.