There is nothing special about the group of men who can often be found sipping pints outside a brasserie in Avignon. They share a few jokes and, in more candid moments, their anxieties about what the future may have in store.
That will be decided in a matter of weeks, when their fate is sealed at the courthouse 200 metres up the road. In their jeans and anoraks they could be tourists taking a break from sightseeing in this beautiful medieval French city — but these men are co-defendants in the country’s largest ever rape trial.
Fifty-one men are charged with raping, sexually assaulting or attempting to rape Gisèle Pelicot, 72, while she was unconscious. Her then-husband Dominique, 71, spent nine years routinely sedating her