By Dimity Clancey and Natalie Clancy
For the first 43 years of her life, Caroline Darian believed her dad, Dominique Pelicot, was a loving family man.
It was all an act. Pelicot was hiding a secret life as a sex criminal, and her unsuspecting mother, Gisele, was his victim.
Caroline Darian, daughter of Gisele Pelicot, arrives in court for the sentencing of her father in December.Credit: AP
“How can you imagine that your father can be one of the worst sexual criminals in France or even across the world?” Darian told 60 Minutes. “I thought he was a respectful man with some values, and then I realised he lied during his whole life, which is heartbreaking.”
Pelicot was sentenced in December to 20 years in jail for drugging and raping his wife, and recruiting other men to have their way with her unconscious body, over nearly a decade.
He recorded the abuse on camera. Police uncovered 20,000 photos and videos involving more than 70 men. But only 50 could be identified, so the rest remain at large.
“When you are a child of both, you know, the perpetrator and the victim, it’s a really difficult legacy,” Darian said.
Gisele Pelicot waived her right to anonymity so the trial of her husband, Dominique, could be publicly aired.Credit: AP
The case shook the world and led to a reckoning in France, where a law that protects the identity of victims would ordinarily mean that the details remained hidden from public view.
But, with the backing of her daughter, Gisele decided to waive her anonymity at the trial late last year.
“I think it was a real gift for society to leave the door open of this court,” Darian said. “My mum became an icon, but my father is a criminal.”
Darian divides her life “before” and “after” her father’s arrest in late 2020. Her mother, who had been married to Pelicot for 50 years, thought they were in a loving marriage until he drew the attention of police by upskirting women at a supermarket.
Forensic psychiatrist Dr Laurent Layet, who interviewed him for police, said that everything Pelicot had told him accorded with what “a normal grandfather” would say.
“I told the police that, for me, there was something that just didn’t gel between what he says and what he did, and they needed to go and look deeper,” Layet said.
Police acted on the doctor’s advice and launched an investigation.
On Pelicot’s phones, computer and hard drives, they found a mountain of evidence – 20,000 photos and videos of Gisele being sexually abused while she was unconscious.
“I think that Dominique Pelicot is one of the biggest sexual criminals that I have ever come across, ” Layet said.
Gisele Pelicot’s sons, David (left) and Florian, and her daughter, Caroline Darian, arrive at the trial of their father in September 2024.Credit: AP
Darian had been worried about her mum’s declining health for years, little realising the cause.
“I cried. I was so angry because I knew that she had some health issues, and I understood right away that it was linked to all of these drugs,” she said. “At this moment of my life, I wanted to die. It was a nightmare.”
The nightmare was about to get even more terrifying.
When police were combing through her father’s files, they discovered Gisele wasn’t the only woman he photographed. There were also pictures of Darian.
“I’m almost naked … there’s no way someone can enter my bedroom for taking those pictures if I’m not drugged,” Darian said.
She strongly believes that her father raped her, too.
“I know that I was drugged and probably, even worse.”
Pelicot admitted at trial to knocking out Gisele with drugs so he could sexually assault her, and to recruiting other men online to rape her while he filmed them. But that might be only the beginning.
The 72-year-old is being investigated for two cold cases. In 1999, a young real estate agent known as Marion was attacked inside a Paris apartment. DNA believed to be the attacker’s was found at the scene, but police couldn’t identify it.
The case was unsolved until a breakthrough in 2022, when police were investigating Pelicot for the abuse of his wife. They entered his DNA into their database, and it matched the sample collected from Marion’s crime scene.
Dominique Pelicot’s co-accused pass security on arrival at the court in Avignon.Credit: AFP
They questioned Pelicot and he confessed. But he hasn’t been charged because a quirk in French law means too much time has lapsed, and the case is essentially closed.
Marion’s lawyer, Florence Rault, said the case could be reopened if investigators could link it to another unsolved crime. And she believes that is possible.
Eight years before Marion was attacked, a similar crime happened in another Paris apartment. But the victim, Sophie Narme, didn’t get away. She was raped and murdered.
“For me, both cases were exactly the same,” Rault said.
“If we can demonstrate and find the proof that we have the same suspect for Sophie’s case, as for Marion’s case, he’ll be judged for Sophie’s case and also judged for Marion’s case.”
Pelicot denies having anything to do with the murder. Darian is following the investigation closely.
“I hope he’s going to be charged, I’m thinking about all of his invisible victims,” she said.
Darian is focused on raising awareness about chemical submission – using drugs to sedate someone to commit a crime against them.
“It can happen in your personal sphere, at home,” she said, “where you should be safe, and where you can’t even imagine that it can happen.”
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