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Reuters

Former French presidential candidate Francois Fillon and his wife Penelope will face trial over the fake jobs scandal that destroyed his 2017 campaign, a judicial source said on Tuesday.
At one stage the clear favourite to win the Elysee Palace keys, Fillon’s campaign was plunged into crisis when a satirical weekly reported Penelope had been paid hundreds of thousands of euros for doing little work, including several years as his parliamentary assistant.

Fillon, 65, also paid two of their children for work as lawyers when he was a senator between 2005 and 2007.
Fillon’s lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
At the time, Fillon denounced what he called a dirty tricks campaign and denied doing anything illegal, though he admitted an error of judgment.
A consummate political insider and former prime minister during Nicolas Sarkozy’s presidency, Fillon resisted pressure from inside his party to pull out of the race and was eliminated in the first round of the election.
President Emmanuel Macron went on to beat far-right leader Marine Le Pen in the run-off.
Under France’s legal system, he can appeal the decision to put him on trial.
Fillon met Penelope, who is from Wales, while she was a student at Sorbonne university in Paris.
They soon married and live in an imposing manor house near Le Mans in northern France where they raised five children.
A low-key political wife who avoided the limelight, Penelope was known as a keen horse-rider who once described herself as a country “peasant” who preferred the countryside to Paris.
In examining Fillon’s insistence that his wife has “always” worked to help his career, French media homed in on previous comments she made.
Penelope said in several interviews that she had never been involved in her husband’s political career, including to Britain’s Telegraph newspaper.
Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse


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France

Former French presidential candidate Francois Fillon and wife to face trial over fake jobs scandal

French presidential election candidate for the right-wing Les Republicains party Francois Fillon with his wife Penelope at a rally in Place du Trocadero, Paris, in March 2017. Photo: AFP

(FILES) In this file photo taken on January 29, 2017, French right wing candidate for the upcoming presidential election Francois Fillon (R) puts his hand on the knee of his wife Penelope (L), as they look on during his campaign rally in Paris. - Two and a half years after the opening of a judicial investigation targeting the Fillon couple, the investigating judges of the French National Finance Public Prosecutor (Parquet national financier - PNF) request the referral to the court of Francois Fillon, his wife Penelope, as well as the former substitute member of parliament of Fillon, Marc Joulaud, according to judicial sources on April 23, 2019. (Photo by Eric FEFERBERG / AFP)

Fillon and his wife Penelope at a campaign meeting in Paris in January 2017. Photo: AP

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One-time favourite to win, Fillon’s campaign was plunged into crisis after reports his wife was paid hundreds of thousands of euros for doing little work


One-time favourite to win, Fillon’s campaign was plunged into crisis after reports his wife was paid hundreds of thousands of euros for doing little work.


Emmanuel Macron