In one sentence, Dominique Pélicot drove her daughter mad, convinced she had been raped

Dominique Pélicot and his daughter, Caroline Darian, who accuses him of having abused her when she was a child, had heated exchanges during the last speeches of the accused at the trial of the Mazan rapes. One sentence lit the powder keg.

She considers herself to be the “great forgotten one” of the Mazan rape trial. Caroline Darian accuses her father, Dominique Pélicot, of drugging her and is convinced that he raped her when she was a child. Accusations that are based on photos found on the computer of the man accused of having raped his sedated wife and handed her over to other men: the photos show a child asleep, naked or in lingerie. They are reminiscent of certain photos of Gisèle Pélicot taken without her knowledge in skimpy outfits, but are not as explicit as those illustrating the rapes suffered by the mother.

Caroline Darian's accusations were not retained at the Mazan rape trial, but they were raised several times by the person concerned who attended the trial, by her mother who is the victim and by her father who is the accused. Although the 45-year-old woman tried to get her father to confess to the rape she believes she suffered, the accused has always denied having harmed or abused his children. “I maintain that I have never touched my children and grandchildren whom I love very much,” the 71-year-old man declared before the Assize Court during his last speech on Tuesday, November 19. Gisèle P&eacutelicot and Caroline Darian's lawyer, Me Camus, had previously asked him to “provide an explanation […] on these photos and this file of “my naked daughter' erased'".

In a speech similar to the one he has been giving since the start of the trial concerning his daughter and possible sexual abuse, Dominique Pélicot said he did not remember having taken his photos and maintained that he had never touched Caroline Darian or any of his other children. “If I had, I would say so. I say it straight to her eyes, I never touched her,” he said from his box, sometimes addressing himself directly to his daughter: “Honestly Caroline I've never done anything to you…”

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He gave the same answer this Wednesday, November 20, after his lawyer, Me Zavarro, informed him that a confession would not change his sentence. An identical defense that he this time accompanied by the expression of his feelings for his daughter and the wish to be believed one day: “Even if she doesn't love me anymore, I will always love her. I know what I did and what I didn't do. […] The only hope I have is that she can have proof that I never did anything."

Words that Caroline Darian does not give any credence to.  "You lie, you lie, you don't have the courage to tell the truth", replied the forty-year-old who has made the fight against chemical submission, of which her mother was a victim and which she thinks she suffered, her fight for four years. At the beginning of the week she had already pointed out her father's lies: “You don't look at me like a father looks at his daughter, but in an incestuous way. But you'll never have the courage to tell the truth,” she had thrown at him again.

Dominique Pélicot asks for his daughter's support

The last exchanges between Caroline Darian and Dominique Pélicot were frustrating or boring depending on the protagonists' point of view, but violent for all. They even became explosive after a sentence uttered by the accused. When a defense lawyer asked him who he would like to see to support him during his detention, the man said he would choose to see his daughter. He added that he was ready to “give [his] life to” [his] daughter so that she doesn't think what she thinks [of him]”.

In response, Caroline Darian promised him solitude: “You will die in lies. You are alone in lies”. And to add, reproaching him for never having admitted the potential abuses that she reproaches him for after the “many occasions” who came forward: “I will never go see you. You will end up alone like a dog.” “We always end up all alone,” replied Dominique Pélicot. But it was his daughter, who remains without answers about the violence she thinks she suffered, who won the contest: “You especially.”