After a French court Thursday found all 51 defendants guilty in a drugging-and-rape case, the victim, Gisele Pelicot said that the trial has been a “difficult ordeal,” but that she never regretted making the case public.

Following a four-month trial in the southeastern city of Avignon, Pelicot’s ex-husband of 50 years, 72-year-old Dominique Pelicot, received a sentence of a maximum of 20 years in prison.

He pleaded guilty in September to repeatedly drugging his wife, raping her while she was unconscious and recruiting strangers to join him over a period of 10 years.

The five-judge panel handed Pelicot’s 50 co-defendants, a group of men from 27 to 74 years old, sentences ranging from three to 20 years in prison.

In her first comments following the verdicts, Gisele Pelicot told reporters her first thoughts were with her three children and her grandchildren, “because they are the future, and it is also for them that I have fought this battle.”

She said she was also thinking of all the other families affected “by this tragedy.” Finally, she said, “I think of the unrecognized victims whose stories often remain in the shadows. I want you to know that we share the same struggle.”

Pelicot has become a symbol of courage and resilience to many, and crowds of supporters gathered outside the courthouse as the case went on.

Asked by reporters about complaints by her supporters that the sentences were too lenient, Pelicot said she respected the court and the decision. She said, “I trust, now, in our capacity to collectively seize a future in which each one of us, woman and man, may live in harmony with mutual respect and understanding.”

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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