The 'Pelicot case' of Manchester: a woman was drugged and raped for decades by her husband and other men

LondonA few days ago, the weekly Charlie Hebdo claimed that the English "might" have found their Pelicot case, in reference to Gisèle Pelicot, the French woman who in 2024 publicly exposed that she was raped by about fifty men while she was unconscious, after being repeatedly drugged by her husband over the years. The satirical publication thus focused on a very similar drama that took place in Stockport, one of the commuter towns south of Manchester, which became partially known in November 2025. On October 19, a mega-trial begins against eleven men accused of raping a woman while she was drugged. In the Pelicot trial, the public prosecutor brought 51 rapists before the court, including the husband.

The English victim is a resident of Stockport, who, in the first instance, was allegedly drugged and raped by her husband for over two decades without her realizing it, due to the narcotic substances he administered to her. The perversion of the husband, a man in his sixties, who cannot be publicly identified to respect the woman's right to anonymity, intensified starting in 2018, when he began inviting other men to the family home to sexually abuse the woman, who was also incapacitated by the effect of the drugs.

The man was arrested in October of last year, and initially denied all charges. But in mid-September of this 2026, he pleaded guilty to 60 crimes committed against his wife between 2004 and 2025. Among the criminal acts he has admitted are multiple rapes, sexual assaults, assaults by penetration, attempted rapes, and the continuous administration of a pharmacological substance with the intention of leaving her incapacitated to facilitate the sexual abuse. He has also admitted to sharing intimate photographs and videos of his wife without her consent.

This Wednesday, October 7, the man appeared again before the Manchester Crown Court, and via video link from prison, he admitted to one more rape and one more sexual assault, committed in August of last year. Since he has pleaded guilty, he will no longer have to be tried for the admitted acts: he now awaits sentencing, which will be handed down when the trial against the other defendants concludes, the men whom he himself invited to rape his wife.

Yesterday, 38-year-old Sean Peers also added himself to the list of confessing aggressors, admitting to an assault by penetration committed in September 2024. Surprisingly, the judge has kept him on bail until the joint sentencing of the eleven defendants arrives. With him, there are now three men who have admitted to having raped and assaulted the woman: the husband, Peers, and 59-year-old Keith Fotheringham. The latter had pleaded guilty to conspiracy to administer a substance inhibiting the woman's will and to assaulting and raping her. In his case, and unlike Peers, he is imprisoned and will be sentenced later.

The other aggressors

The parallelism with the Pelicot case is evident, especially due to the role attributed to the husband. The prosecution maintains that he organized and facilitated the abuse by the other men. In this sense, the police assert that between 2018 and October 2025, he had invited them to sexually abuse the woman while she was incapacitated by drugs. Some of the accused allegedly participated directly in the assaults; others are accused of having facilitated the abuse or conspiring to commit it. The eleven involved are aged between 28 and 74.

The defendants who deny the accusations will be tried. Among them are a paramedic, a former football club executive, a taxi driver, a university technician, and a youth football coach. One of them, Karl Lindsay, 55, and former chief executive of Taunton Town FC, is also accused of having provided the drugs used to incapacitate the victim and of having organized the abuse as well. He also denies everything.

The prosecution's forecast is that the trial will last approximately nine weeks, until mid-December. The jury has already been selected, but the process has been delayed due to legal issues. One of these issues is that the defense has recently received a statement from the husband in which he explains his version of events, which has forced the court to give the lawyers time to study it.

Aside from the number of people involved who will sit before the judge, the biggest difference compared to the Gisèle Pelicot case is that she herself voluntarily renounced her anonymity and turned the trial against her husband and the 50 accused into a public denunciation of sexual violence against women. In Manchester, on the other hand, the victim's identity is protected by law. Dominique Pelicot ended up being sentenced to twenty years in prison, and the rest of the accused were also found guilty, although with lighter sentences.