A French court has sentenced a man to 25 years in prison for the torture and rape of his former girlfriend over a period of seven years. The case has horrified the nation and drawn comparisons to the infamous Gisele Pelicot case.
The Crimes of Guillaume Bucci
Guillaume Bucci, a 51-year-old former bank manager, admitted to recruiting strangers to have sex with Laetitia R., a 42-year-old mother of four, and subjecting her to torture including strangulation, bestiality, and burning between 2015 and 2022. The abuse began shortly after the birth of their daughter.
The horrific acts included forcing her to drink urine, lick public toilets, and have sex with nearly 500 men, many of whom were friends, colleagues, and strangers. The woman, identified only as Laetitia, told the court she "stopped counting" at 487 men, some of whom she saw up to 10 times.
Victim's Testimony
Laetitia, who now suffers from significant disabilities due to the abuse, described living in "constant fear" that Bucci would release intimate recordings if she left him. Text messages showed he threatened to kill her if she did not comply. "I felt like I was dying inside. There was a part of me that broke permanently," she said.
She recounted how Bucci gradually forced her into sexual encounters with other men. On Christmas Eve 2015, he made her go to a gas station and "offer herself to strangers" while he listened over the phone. Days after giving birth to their daughter in 2017, she was forced to perform a sex act on a truck driver.
Inspiration from Gisele Pelicot
Laetitia was inspired to come forward publicly by Gisele Pelicot, another French woman whose husband drugged and pimped her out to dozens of men. Pelicot's husband received 20 years in prison. Unlike Pelicot, Laetitia was kept conscious during the abuse. "He said I needed to realize what was happening to me," she told French media before the trial. "I remember everything."
French prosecutors sought a life sentence for Bucci, citing the "risk of reoffending against another woman." However, the court sentenced him to 25 years, with parole possible after two-thirds of the sentence.
