The Court of Cassation definitively confirmed on Wednesday the guilt of François Fillon in the case of his wife’s fictitious jobs, but the high court ordered a new trial concerning the sentences handed down against him and the damages. A new hearing will therefore be held in the coming months before the Paris Court of Appeal to re-examine the sanctions imposed on the former Prime Minister, 70, sentenced on appeal on May 9, 2022 to four years of imprisonment, including one year firm, 375,000 euros fine and 10 years of ineligibility.
“The Court of Appeal was wrong in the evaluation,” thunders François Fillon’s lawyer at the microphone of Europe 1. According to him, the Court “considered that there was absolutely no work by the part of Penelope Fillon, that everything was fictitious, this is not the case”, affirms the lawyer, for whom it is now necessary “to review this compensation”. “Here again, there will be a new trial. For the moment, François Fillon has not been definitively convicted, he will continue to appear before his judges and assert his rights.”
126,167 euros granted to the National Assembly
The highest court of the judiciary, which controls compliance with the rules of law and not the merits of the cases, also considered that the court of appeal had to rule again on the amount of 126,167 euros awarded to the National Assembly in damages for Pénélope Fillon’s parliamentary assistant contract with her husband in 2012-2013. On the other hand, the conviction of Pénélope Fillon, 68 years old (two years suspended prison sentence and 375,000 euros fine) and that of Marc Joulaud, 56 years old (three years suspended prison sentence) are confirmed by the Court of Cassation.
The “Penelopegate” affair broke out with the revelations of Chained duck in January 2017, when François Fillon was a candidate of the right and the center in the presidential election. At first instance, he was sentenced on June 29, 2020 to five years in prison, including two years, with the same fine and ineligibility.