The youngest man to rape Giséle Pelicot after her predator ex-husband drugged her did so on the day his first daughter was born.
Joan Kawai, who has been jailed for 10 years, was just 23 when he visited Ms Pelicot’s family home in southern France to abuse her five years ago.
The former French conscript was among 47 men, including Ms Pelicot’s former husband Dominique Pelicot, convicted of rape at a packed French courthouse on Thursday.
The three-month trial heard how Pelicot - dubbed the “Beast of Avignon” - drugged his then-wife to whom he had been married for 50 years for over a decade so he and strangers could abuse her while he filmed it.
He catalogued more than 20,000 videos of the crimes carried out over the years at their home in Avignon and was only discovered when he was caught up-skirting a woman in a supermarket.
Ms Pelicot was unaware of the abuse right up until the point he was arrested - even wondering if she had Alzheimer’s due to poor memory and hair loss caused by her unknown sedation.
Kawai first went to Mr Pelicot’s house in November 2019, the day his daughter was born, and even returned for a second time, the Vaucluse court previously heard.
He admitted to rape and and said he never asked if Ms Pelicot had consented to the sexual activity, before acknowledging she was unconscious.
He was among dozens of others recruited by Pelicot through online chatroom Coco - who used a pseudonym on a forum called “à son insu”, meaning “without her knowledge” to solicit the rapists.
On Thursday, Pelicot sobbed as he was jailed for the maximum term of 20 years as part of the historic mass rape trial.
Standing defiant to cheers outside the court, Ms Pelicot said she had “led the fight” for future generations and she did not regret waiving her right to anonymity.
“I’m thinking about all the other families affected by this case and the unrecognised victims in these stories that are often in the shadows - you share my struggle,” Ms Pelicot said.
