“I’ve seen individuals who deny rape parade before the court,” she said. “I want to tell these men: at which moment when you enter that bedroom did Ms Pelicot give you consent?”
“I’ve heard ‘I was manipulated’, I’ve heard ‘I drank a glass of water, I was drugged’. But at what point did they not realise?”
Ms Pelicot was also asked why she continued to use her ex-husband’s name when her own children had been using other names.
The room was hushed as she responded calmly that when she had first gone into the court in Avignon her children were ashamed of the name, but that her grandchildren were still called Pelicot.
“Today I want them to be proud of their grandmother,” she declared.
“My name is known across the world now. They shouldn’t be ashamed of carrying that name. Today we will remember Gisèle Pelicot.”
Not long before she took the stand, the last of the 50 defendants, Philippe L, said he had been “surprised” by the situation when Dominique Pelicot had welcomed him into his home and insisted that he penetrate Gisèle Pelicot.
He also denies rape, arguing he put his conscience aside and “was thinking with my penis instead of my brain”.
The atmosphere in the courtroom became heated when Ms Pelicot was questioned by defence lawyer Nadia El-Bouroumi, who suggested she had used “harsh words” towards the other defendants, but not her husband.
“Looking at you – and I’m sorry to say this – I wondered whether we’d ever see you cry,” El-Bouroumi asked at one point.
The lawyer’s combative and sometimes aggressive tone elicited gasps from the public and the media inside the courtroom, and several people shook their heads in disbelief.