A woman who was raped by dozens of men after her husband allegedly drugged her gave evidence in court in the southern French city of Avignon, detailing the “barbaric” acts.

“The image is unbearable, I’m lying lifeless in my bed, asleep, and they’re about to rape me,” the 71-year-old said in the courtroom, according to local media.

“It’s a barbaric scene. They look at me like a bag of rubbish; it’s unbearable, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to get up again,” she said.

Her husband, a 72-year-old pensioner whom she has since divorced, went on trial in Avignon on Monday for allegedly drugging his wife and having her raped by dozens of men.

Fifty other men have been accused of taking part in the abuse.

The offences are said to have taken place over around 10 years.

On Monday, the woman appeared in the courtroom accompanied by her three children.

She wanted to look the defendants in the eye, her lawyer said.

The defendants, 18 of whom are in custody, are men between 21 and 68 years old at the time of the offences.

According to the indictment, the pensioner made contact with them online.

He is not said to have asked them for money but instead gained satisfaction from watching others rape his wife.

Most of the accused have admitted the offences, local media reported.

However, a minority testified that they had not known that the victim had been drugged, and thought that she was only pretending to be asleep.

A defence lawyer representing six of the accused said the men had assumed that the couple were playing sex games.

The woman on Thursday rejected those claims.

“These people knew very well what they were doing and what a lethargic state I was in,” she said.

The years of abuse only came to light when the pensioner was arrested for filming under the skirts of supermarket customers.

Investigators discovered hundreds of videos of the offences on the man’s computer.

According to the videos, 72 men had sex with the woman, but the police were unable to identify all of them.

The woman said she had been unaware of the abuse because her husband had administered high doses of drugs.

However, she had long complained of memory lapses and severe fatigue.

“I was sedated, like before going into the operating theatre; afterwards you can no longer remember the operation.

“That’s exactly what happened to me,” she said in court.

(dpa/NAN)